By: Not_Omegon
Connor Campbell, eldest of four, greatest disappointment and greatest pride of his family, ex-Blackwater contractor, and menace of Fallujah, stepped out into this new world. It was a fresh start for him, a chance to get away from his problems of old, his failed relationships, his previous mistakes and all the rest of the things big and small that were crashing down upon him. Now was not the time to dwell on them though, nor should it ever be again. For once he wasn’t doing something for the money and benefits, he didn’t take what was offered out of greed but rather for atonement more than anything else.
Normally his spirits would have been immediately dampened as a boy though if he came as he just did. His guts felt like they had been squeezed and twisted as he stepped through the portal here, his brain felt like it had been placed under a car crusher, and overall like he had become seriously ill in an instant. Fortune had it that it was over within the minute though, but he wasn’t problem-free yet it seemed. All around him was impenetrable darkness and dampness. He fumbled for his flashlight, one of the many things he brought, but it was smacked out of his hand the moment he brought it up, then he himself was smacked hard on the back of his head, just like when he was outside of Baghdad.
“How interesting… an interloper… in my home? No, wait… yes!” Halmak shook her head and popped her knuckles, clearing her mind from the whispers and ghastly visions. “Come on, wake wake wake up!” She smacked her strange new captive across its soft face. “Yes, move, breathe, open those eyes, all the luxuries that those who don’t trespass enjoy. You won’t be able to soon enough.”
His eyes fluttered open to a house of horrors. Before him stood a small lizard person with wings whose scales and eyes were black as night. Torchlight danced behind the lizard, revealing body parts of animals and lizard people, massive bug legs nailed to the walls, bones all over the place, it was a hellscape not dissimilar to the end of a couple of old friends. That just wasn’t going to do, that was not his fate, it couldn’t be. He didn’t slip through the hands of death only for it to happen here, never.
Already he could see his vision darkening in his mix of anger and terror but with the last remnants of conscious thought, he slipped out. Just like the first time, he merely did a small tug to test the nature of his bonds, then with his insane flexibility he just slipped the chains and let them clatter against the wall they’re attached to. It was made easier by not being burdoned with all of his stuff, but that was a small blessing attached to a massive pile of problems in of itself. That was only the opening though, the first trick. Spotting an exit, he lashed out and punched the lizard on the snout and bolted for the passageway. A new set of problems now presented outside of that terrible room though, the exit was really just a dark, long tunnel, or maybe many tunnels judging by the few beaten down wooden doors along its sides.
“Every door is an opportunity,” he muttered under his breath as he slipped through a random one, hoping to create more distance before whatever that thing was got its bearings again. It was pitch black inside, no torches or anything, something which was both a boon and a curse as being able to hide easier is nice but hide where, by what? He didn’t know, so it was up to his hands to fix that as he began feeling around, feeling the rough texture of the cold stone walls, the cold, sharp edges of a three inch blade, the… he paused and then took the knife for himself, then went back to getting a feel for the room. In another corner on the ground, there was a puddle of something viscous and sticky, he didn’t do a taste test on that. Along the back wall, there was a wooden rod that wasn’t worth his time, and in a different corner on the low hanging roof, there was a wooden grate covering a hole that led into another cavity dug out into the stone, equally dark of course so he didn’t bother trying to map out that space quite yet.
Over all, it was a relatively empty space, nothing to hide behind or anything so the smallest amount of light would reveal his extremely pale form immediately. He didn’t plan on sticking around for that to happen anyways though. Leaving the grate removed, he squatted down beneath that hole in the ceiling with the knife in hand, ready to either charge and take an intruder by surprise, or to escape. In either case, he would wait for his captor to do the rounds so he could posssibly slip out behind it.
Hour 2:
For ten minutes, the shouting and slamming of things against the walls has been unnerving him to no end. The yelling was only growing closer as well, close enough that it was time for him to ready his feet and tighten the grip on the knife. But as a second voice screeched from probably a few feet away, he changed his mind and climbed up into the upper room to take on the defensive approach.
Connor placed the grate back over the hole and released a breath he didn’t know he was holding, and closed his eyes. He felt strange, was it nervousness taking hold of him? No, his hands would be shaking slightly, he knows this. Was he ill? No, flus and colds have other symptoms. The only oddity right now was a warm feeling in his head, not anything painful or disruptive, just a soft heat that wasn’t anything usual for him. Opening his eyes again, the darkness was gone. The room wasn’t light by any means, but he could see.
That wasn’t at all normal and surprised him a little. As the warmth in his head increased slightly, he shut his eyes again, then the warmth spiked. Behind him, he could see or at least felt like he could see, was another winged lizard person, black as coal and ready to lunge at him. When the lizard finally did jump, baring teeth and claws as it did so, Connor opened his eyes. It was all so confusing, did he just have a short dream? He felt like he was awake though, and his fast beating heart did add to the realness.
He turned around like he had in that short 5 second dream. Just like in that dream, to his shock, were black lizard things, but instead of moving to attack him it was laying on the ground, sleeping. He only saw one in the dream, but he didn’t check for any on the ground. Gripping his knife, he went into full commando mode and slowly approached the group.
The one in the middle stirred though before opening its pure black eyes, then in rapid pace hopped up and lunged at Connor, just like he had seen in his little daydream. It screeched and lashed out with a clawed hand, but he stepped back out just out of its reach in a quick but fluid motion. With a quixk follow up, he ran the knife upwards along its chest and through the throat, dropping his assailant in an instance. The rest of them were awake now and making noise. “Shut up beasts, shut up and stay in your place,” he hissed, quickly slashing and carving up the things far more smoothly and speedily than he would ever be able to do normally.
“Ha!” Connor’s captor yelled through the hole between the two rooms. The thing was now wearing a helmet to match the armor he could see clearly now. It too was black as night, but it did little to obscure the person in the pitch black room as Connor’s vision cut right through the darkness. The captor tried climbing up through the hole but he twisted around and kicked it in the head. While it yelled and screamed incomprehensible words, he dove through the room’s actual exit in the wall, landing himself in yet another corridor.
Now the chase was on, he had to get out as fast as possible which was likely up given that he was underground. As he ran down the long curved tunnel, he started having another daydream, or vision. A large centipede in an even larger room at the end of a hallway was seen, the giant twenty foot long bug clacking its mandibles towards him and charging his way. Then his mind cleared as quickly as the vision came. After three minutes when he reached the end of the tunnel, the vision was proven to be such and not just a mere dream. The clacking was a dead giveaway and he immediately turned around, looking for another path. Trying a door to his right a few dozen yards from the end, he slipped in and froze as a clawed black hand swung towards his face. He was fine though, as if nothing happened at all. It wasn’t even real.
He shook his head and looked around, seeing that the room led into another tunnel with a light at the end. The walls were far from smooth though, there were large pits in the sides and crevices that reached around into the ceiling as well. He climbed down into one of these and perched himself into a hole, well below eye level. He had too many things to figure out on the run, things like food and water. Could he eat these lizard things? Where do they get water? He had to pause and figure out how to find such things.
Hour 4:
The visions just kept flowing for two whole hours, dreams of what maygm come to be. All horrible, filled with death, why did he ever come here? Another scene played out behind his eyes, lizard folk with blue and white scales flew across the sky with bows in hand, shooting as they flew. Below them was a normal man in large black armor that deflected the arrows, he was wielding a large mace and crushing more white lizard things without effort.
He then saw more humans, men set against more men. He couldn’t make out any features on them, and when it devolved, showing man killing man, he could start to make out armor. One man with great white glowing horns on his shoulders and chest was fleeing, another with great feathered wings was diving downwards, and another with blue armor was being stabbed in the back.
The visions were slowing though, finally, until another one appeared. It was himself, Connor, sitting on the ground in a jungle. It was silent, calm and peaceful beyond imagination. He looked pained though, it showed on his face. Then a cracking sound ripped through Connor’s mind just before he saw his head burst open in his vision. Right before the vision ended though, he saw the end of a rifle’s barrel and the words “it has been done. Returning home,” echoed through his mind. Surely that isn’t how he dies, by the bullet of an assassin no less. The visions were accurate as far as what has already come to pass, but those were little things involving stuff five seconds in the future, not his death whenever. It was disturbing.
Hour 5:
Connor could hear someone walking down the hall, he could hear claws clacking on the ground and the clicking of a tongue every now and then as well. Maybe the thing would just walk past him while being totally unaware of his presence? That was wishful thinking though, the thing was picking up pace and grumbling in the same harsh language. He could see the orange light of a torch shining off the stone around him as it came closer so he slowly brought his knife up, ready to lash out.
He didn’t have the chance though as the clawed hand of the thing came down and reached for his face. Connor was ready though, stabbing the palm of the hand with the knife before pushing it away, then delivering a smaller cut on the back of one of its digitigrade legs. He followed up by launching himself out of his hidey hole and tried running his knife along the back of one of the knees but missed. As he recovered, he could see thin clouds of darkness trying to cling onto him, as if the shadows were cloaking him. He didn’t mind though, he had a lizard to kill.
His opponent was a bag of tricks though as it smacked its left arm and shot a stream of liquid just passed him, barely missing. The hissing on the ground behind Connor hinted at what was just shot at him and he could feel his blood draining out of his face. The lizard looked shocked, as if it thought it absolutely would hit, and he used that moment to strike again. Barely hitting his target in a short swing, he dug the edge of the knife into the upper arm and pushed down, skinning part of the arm as blue blood was sent everywhere.
The screams of pain were earsplitting, but Connor wasn’t done, he had shocked the thing so far and he had to press the advantage before it could recover. With a quick slash, he sliced open its throat and the screams turned into a gurgle of blood and air. As he finished it off with a final, heavy cut to sever the head, another vision came of another winged black lizard man thing running down the hall behind him with weapons beared.
He quickly snuffed out the torch that fell on the ground and pressed himself into the wall, using the total darkness to give himself the advantage assuming that his foe can’t see in the dark as he can. Then as sure as night, another foe came running down the hall without a torch, feeling the walls as it went and inevitably tripped on the body of the dead one. Connor plunged his knife into its back and killed it, his easiest fight yet.
He rummaged through the two bodies for a couple minutes, taking the set of gauntlets from the second one that had three blades on the knuckles of them, each one a foot long. The first one didn’t have much. Just some miscellaneous junk like a random eyeball and a red leaf. With the bodies checked, he used his knife to hack off a part of a leg and moved on down the corridor.
Hour 9:
Charred reptilian meat wasn’t exactly tasty, and the blue flesh looked nasty as well but food was food. The occasional echo of something clacking against the ground or the rare sounds of talking made it impossible to find rest, so he resolved to just push on. The tunnels were vast, and it was a struggle to keep track of if he was ultimately going up or going down.
There weren’t even rooms in this area, just tunnels and dead ends with the occasional busted up wooden cart in them as if it was a vast mine shaft. He kept trying to navigate these corridors to find a way up but maybe he was going the wrong way the entire time. Maybe he had to go back towards where he was held captive. That wasn’t favorable though, it was asking to be gutted by those reptile things if he went back, but it seemed the same would happen of he kept going forward as well.
He walked into a large open space, two stories tall and with a walkway around the edge on the second level that he walked out upon. On the bottom level were rows of black lizard hostiles, twenty sleeping, and the torch light from another exit illuminated them all in yellow. He could hear the labors of more of those things further away, maybe the same amount of hostiles as are in the room with him. It was practically suicide to stay there, but he felt emboldened. He had the advantage of surprise, he was nearly impossible to beat in this darkness as is with his enhanced sight but with the visions providing precognition as well, he was a monster to be feared.
With the intent to kill them to a man, Connor made sure his talons were tight on his hands and then jumped down, skewering one foe as he landed. He ran down the row of ten on the left, slashing open throats, stabbing chests, tearing up their bodies and generally maiming them as he went. Everyone else started getting up and the cries of alarm went out; it was go time. “That’s right, cry for the help that will never come,” he muttered under his breath as he stabbed another in the neck and kicked to the ground. As more made their way into the room, he could feel his entire body warming up on the inside as if he was about to get the mother of all visions. One never came though, and instead as he raised his talons to strike another foe down, the torch near the exit went out entirely on its own… maybe. The room was completely dark now though, it was a slaughter of blind, confused sheep to him.
Now that darkness has fallen, he danced his way around the edge of the space, hacking and slashing as the horde tried to follow the sounds of screaming, coughing, and gurgling. He dodged wild swings of hammers and swords, letting them hit each other when they did. Short visions warned him of dangerous attacks, allowing him to weave through them before killing the offender. As he thinned out the herd, more torch light appeared down the hall approaching him. He hastened his slaughter, finally killing them all as they would never relent and flee.
He walked through the deep puddles of blue blood, ready for more. He could see a reflection of himself on the wet ground, covered from head to toe in blue blood, it was a mess. There was no time to look at it further though, the new wave had come and at its front was his original captor. Had he gone in a massive loop over the past day? Just the thought was demoralizing. But the time for thinking was over already as a stray attacker charged him. He dispatched it easily, then eyed the one holding the torch.
Moving back, he tried to find a way around the one in the black armor and maybe isolate it. He couldn’t though, the leader shouted something and the five others with him nearly lunged at him. They were uncoordinated like the ones before them, but the light had him exposed to them. Connor dove to the right as the one with the torch came within a hair’s breadth from him and took out its legs. As intended, it fell and the torch came splashing into another pool of blood, putting it out. With darkness restored, he kicked another one down then sprung back up, butchering the ones still breathing. Their leader was smarter though, it looked right at him and held its sword in a defensive position.
It looked like it was following sounds to track him, keeping track of his footsteps over the bodies and in the puddles. As Connor continued walking in a semicircle, he scooped up a dagger and slowly approached it. But before he came too close, he instead threw the dagger at the ground two meters away from it. He didn’t know what to expect, but a quick swing as it leaned forward was probably to be anticipated as it tried hitting him. He grabbed another helmet and threw it right at it, infuriating it. It slowly moved forward in his direction, expecting him to be right where he still is. He then grabbed an axe.
Connor threw that axe as hard as he could, striking the chest of his foe with the top of the axe’s head. Now it was pissed, and he charged it just after the axe struck it. Blocking with his left talons, he tried stabbing with his right but the armor stopped him. Trying again, he attempted to gut the thing but again the armor stopped him. A third try at the neck was also stopped, something that should be impossible given that he should’ve pierced the soft gap. The thing gave a harsh laugh as it stepped back and swung in a wide arc, barely nicking his left calf. He couldn’t hurt it, even when he tried tearing its throat out. Panicking, he shouldered the thing to get it off balance then ran in the direction it came from, hoping to find a way out.
He charged through the empty corridors leaving a trail of bloodied boot prints. He could hear it attempting to chase him until it tripped over another body. That was slightly amusing until he remembered that it was an unmovable object. After he created enough distance from his would-be pursuer, he began looking for torch light in the hopes that signs of recent activity would lead him to an exit.
Hour 13:
He slapped himself a few times to keep his eyes open as he creeped through more corridors. So many hours of constant activity was exhausting, but the inhabitants of the underground would give him no rest. He would find the occasional group of lizard things, get in a skirmish, slaughter them, then move on after eating some of them. It was a tiresome ordeal that yielded no way out, as if he was trapped in a maze for eternity.
Ahead, there were more torches and the sound of scratching on the stone walls. So many torches that it was almost blinding after near perpetual darkness but it still gave hope. With so much fire, there had to be somewhere to vent the smoke such as the outdoors. With that in mind, Connor pressed on with bloodied talons up and ready to shred anything before him.
As he picked up his pace, he could hear the scratching stop only to be replaced with a low, rumbling growl. The lizard folk never growled, they always shrieked and yelled before trying to carve him up. This had Connor’s hair raised and somewhat concerned, but he didn’t slow down. There was no reason to worry, he’s been nothing short of a walking lizard mincer and with the short visions all having been proven true so far, he knew his fate as well. Most importantly that he was outside when he dies, not in some dusty tunnel. Whatever awaited him wouldn’t kill him so he charged forward.
As Connor bursts into the well lit and large room, he spots a winged lizard person standing before a table that was covered in odd parts of animals, but that thing wasn’t the source of the growling. That didn’t matter though, he continued running until he was a few feet from the thing before it broke its concentration on whatever it was doing and panicked. Quickly, it pulled at a round object on its chest and threw it at the ground. As a series of rings and lines on the ground about where it landed began to glow, the lizard thing vanished into thin air like it was never there. The steel of his weapon smacked against the wall behind where his target just was as he tried to retain his balance, then the growling returned again.
In a brief fit of rage, he smashed his fists against the table a few times, nearly breaking it, before looking back at a wooden barricade covering a large hole in the side of the wall. Whatever was making that noise was behind it, and it wanted out. “I’m fuckin’ sick of this shit,” he muttered under his breath. As quickly as possible he put out every torch in the room, letting his newly discovered but already taken for granted night vision carry him through the moment. Then four swift kicks to the poorly made wooden construct broke a whole in the mess that he tore wide open with his talons. He paid no heed to what was on the other side, it wasn’t going to kill him so it could wait until he started killing it instead.
He was stunned when he finally saw what manner of beast was on the other side. It looked like a jaguar at first, but it wasn’t such an animal anymore. Twisted black horns were sticking out of the spine and surrounded with scars from many incisions, the teeth were long and dark, the muscles were five times larger than they should be. It had a face twisted and scarred, and the two completely black eyes were partially covered in scarred skin drooping over them. It sniffed the air for a couple seconds and opened its maw, unfurling the grotesque long thing that was supposed to be a tongue. As it squated back and planted its feet as if to pounce, Connor swiped at it, grazing its muzzle and drawing blood.
The beast let out a harrowing roar before lunging forward, biting down on the talons on his left hand. The roaring turned to a whimper for a moment as the blades went between the teeth and into its gums, but went back to normal after Connor pulled them out, cutting deeper into the beast. It tried pouncing again at him, but in the total darkness he stepped to the side and let it crash into the wall. He didn’t let it recover, quickly plunging his talons into the beast’s side repeatedly until its guts were torn apart and flowing onto the floor.
“Ughh,” he shook his talons, sending more blood spatter everywhere and adding some red to the mess of blue blood that covered him. He had to rub the sleep out of his eyes before going back to finding a way out.
Hour 16:
More visions, always more visions. He can’t shamble down a tunnel in peace like this. He saw his death again, his head going pop and the unknown assassin stating that he’s going back home. News ones happened as well though. A castle on fire was repeated every now and then, nothing interesting with that other than that it was a different structure each time. He also saw a dragon flying through the sky, trying in vain to fend off an angelic looking attacker. It was the man with wings again, he danced around the dragon with sword in hand and it looked like he was winning with the amount of blood being drawn from the great beast, it was almost raining blood.
He saw himself crawling through a stone tunnel, not like these ones but one lined with cut stone blocks. A man in yellow pursued him but he couldn’t keep up, Connor always slipped away into the darkness. He didn’t know what led to this, why was he being hunted? Was it he who caused it, or was it the man wearing yellow?
Connor shook his head trying to make the vision go away but it didn’t work. Ignoring it also didn’t work, he would just have to live with it while he tried to find some sunlight.
Hour 20:
He tried finding a spot to rest for once but sleep is impossible down here. A small group of lizard things happened upon him when he tried sleeping and nearly got him, but he still killed them like any other. At least he had some food though now.
Every now and then he swore he heard something coming down the halls, but he wasn’t sure if it was real or just his sleep deprived mind. It wasn’t too much of an issue yet anyways, he would cross the bloodsoaked bridge and kill something when he got to it, otherwise it would have to wait if it was real.
What wouldn’t have to wait though was the giant spider before him. Last week he wasn’t afraid of a single spider, but this thing was the size of a man and had way too many eyes and legs to not be creepy. The giant fangs didn’t help either, or all the noises it made. He could hear whenever a leg moved because of the blood being pushed into it, and the breathing was an ever present whistle that was nothing short of irritating. That breathing had to stop, he was way too irritable at the moment for this arachnid shaped nonsense.
He charged forward, talons up and then struck down, breaking off a leg and surprising the giant creepy crawly. He tried following up on the surprise attack, moving to puncture the body by stabbing through one of the larger eyes but he missed. The spider was keen on fighting back to his misfortune. The bug swiped forward with its remaining front leg and sent Connor onto the ground before moving forward, snapping at him with its mandibles. He tried keeping it at bay but it was a losing battle. He scraped up the underside of the spider, his talons clacking against the thick carapace as it nearly bit off his head.
Connor was desperate, trying to inch his way backwards while slashing and stabbing at it to make it think twice about committing to a killing blow. He kept fighting, kept inflicting pain upon it until it reeled back and to his horror, started producing webbing to begin tying him up. Now he was definitely fighting for his life, he wasn’t going to die today, and certainly not like this. With the space granted to him by the spider, he popped up onto his feet and pushed all he had onto a killing strike. He lashed out, tearing into the spider where the abdomen and thorax are joined together with both talons, then pulled the two apart as hard as he could. The spider froze for a second as he pulled, then he heard some cracks, mostly the spiders and one was just him popping his wrist. When it finally separated, it fell backwards then the giant legs curled up.
His heart was beating fast and his hands were shaking. He didn’t want to be near that thing any longer, it already nearly made him shit himself once and it wasn’t any less terrifying while dead. Slowly stepping around the dismembered spider, Connor shakily jogged away from it as he got away from his new biggest fear.
Hour 21:
“Enough! Come get me!” Connor shouted, letting it echo down the tunnels before yelling again. “Get me out of here else I start hunting!”
There was no response though, not anything in the form of screeching or clicking of claws on stone at least. He got goosebumps nonetheless though and he felt an urge to turn around. Why not turn around then? It was instinct that has kept him going so far.
He was quick to do so, almost jerking his head around to stare at the twisted idea of a grim reaper. Behind him in the dark stood a man shrouded in putrid smoke that gives a burning sensation, a tall and pale man who was almost gaunt in appearance, but was covered in rusted armor, a gas mask, a hood, and somehow had a set of massive and tattered bug wings on his back. Connor started walking away, then jogging, then he ran but it drifted right behind him at the same pace as him. It lifted its beat up scythe and slammed down the end on the ground.
He turned his head and tried to sprint for a few seconds but he was too tired, too worn out to do so. He turned back and the reaper was replaced. Now there was a different man, this one was glowing brightly like a star. Despite being hard to look at, he saw the golden armor, the massive horns over the shoulders and on the chest, the flowing red hair, and the color shifting eyes. There were glowing symbols all over this figure that would move and change as he physically grew in size. He pointed his strange curved glaive at Connor before vanishing in a flash of light.
Was this a vision? Was this just mundane hallucinations? He couldn’t tell, he didn’t even know if there was a difference. More figures appeared behind him. One man had flowing white hair and armor painted in purple. As he spun his sword around, his objectively handsome, no, beautiful despite being a man, turned to a grimace. Then there was another man covered in blue blood spatter. In his hands were two axes and around his waist hung several skulls. He radiated an aura of rage around him, hate and betrayal flowed out of him before it increased tenfold when its teeth became pointed and a pair of massive dragon-like wings appeared on its back. The next was a less freakish person, he was more average except for more strange symbols painted over his skin and bug shell armor. What the strange part of this figure was is the malicious smile plastered over his face, it just felt wrong to him. Then there was a smaller man, positively young and energetic. He too wore armor, like these were all soldiers, but his was covered in blue scales and he held a small spear. It made his head hurt to look at this figure though as it shifted ever slightly based on perspective, as if it were two figures poorly placed over each other. The two after that were both clad in very large armor and well equipped in guns and melee weapons. One had a red eye painted on his chest, and the other black and yellow hazard stripes on the shoulders and arms. They both looked extremely serious as if concentrating on something important.
Finally, the last apparition or vision, it looked like himself. Only this Connor was slightly paler and the hair was longer with scar could be seen over his mouth and bags were under his eyes. He was obscured in a smoky blackness that defied his sight and hid everything but the face. This Connor snarled at him, “necessity,” it hissed, “all is necessary.” Then the apparition vanished in a puff of pitch black smoke before a beetle the size of a black bear emerged from the cloud.
He stood there for a moment trying to figure out why he was seeing a big bug slowly approaching him until he was pushed back by the thing. The bug paused, sweeping its antennae from side to side until Connor cut them off. He smirked a little, glad that it was actually real. With a quick jab downwards, he severed its small head and avoided the whole spider fiasco entirely.
Hour 27:
“F-finally, insolent nuisance, I’ve got you,” Halmak whispered as she crept up on a runaway captive that was drifting around the tunnels. With a wave of her hand forward, she sent the six darklings with her charging towards that hideous thing, this time to kill rather than detain. “It is bad manners to kill nearly everything in someone else’s home, pale death thing… Bad! It used to be punishable by getting pushed off the edge, AGHH! Why now!?” She flinched as her armor stung her with a hot, searing pain for a second. “That hair-head pale thing is a curse,” Halmak mumbled when she looked back at her prey slaughtering her darklings.
The thing danced around as it slit open throats and sheared off sections of flesh with each slash. With every pass of one of the many lit torches in this section, they were extinguished and the area became darker. She knew it was trying to remove the light, it could obviously see in the dark and that little trick has been the bane of her existence as of late. Curiously, as it fought and butchered, it looked like it was fighting something invisible as well, taking a swipe where there was nothing sometimes.
The thing hissed at her before charging, bearing those menacing metal claws down at her that she distinctly remembered a darkling she turned from the fallen keep using. She was ready though, with her sword out and swinging in a wide arc at its head she prepared to kill her biggest fuck up. That thing alone made her reconsider the merits of taking living captives. The thing moved like a gust of wind though, avoiding her strike almost entirely and only taking a cut downwards over its mouth. “Die for me! Die die die DIE!” It was stubborn though, dodging her powerful strikes repeatedly if barely, and when she pushed for a quick jab it simply countered by cutting off her thumb on her sword arm. She screamed in agony for a brief moment before it turned into a growl as rage overtook her. She couldn’t vent it though, the thing was fast and knocked her sword away entirely.
It grew closer every moment until its face was right in front of her snout and looking her in the eyes. Halmak snapped at it in a vain attempt to bite off its face but missed. It pulled back just in time before pushing her against the wall. As she tried to recover and steady herself, it slammed her against the wall again with its shoulder, then again with its hands just to make sure before turning its back on her.
“Turn around! You will not… no, you will pay! I will wear your fingers on my horns!” She lunged at it, hoping to take it by surprise but as if it were reading her thoughts, it turned around and shoved a torch in her face before slamming her head against the ground.
Hour 28:
Connor paced back and forth around his initial captive as he have a visual check of his work. The thing was stripped of its clunky armor and bound by a few fraying and damaged ropes that he had found among the rubbish in the few rooms around him. The thing snarled back at him but it didn’t make him change his feigned look of indifference. “Where is an exit outside, disgusting creature. Speak, else I get straight to enacting some retribution on you,” his voice came out low and cold, he could almost taste the malice coming from him.
The thing murmured some gibberish and an eye twitched, there was a language barrier that passed over his tired mind that he forgot about. After slapping the thing’s face to get its full attention, he started gesturing with his hands. He pointed at the room’s exit and moved his hands as if it were a door, then pointed at a torch and up above his head. With a hand open and level and the other a fist moving in an arc above his palm, he attempted to mimic the sun but the thing turned its head away and closed its eyes. “Ugh, not like you would’ve been able to help being tied up and all. Very well, you shouldn’t have ignored me, you bastard.” He took its hands that were bound in front of it and then chopped off a finger with his knife. “Uh huh, yep, your screams keep me awake so I can do this longer. Here, this is for holding me against my will,” he then flayed the scaly skin off of another finger.
He quickly looked behind him, thinking that he heard something. It was nothing though, maybe just hallucinations or visions again, or both. Turning back, he then began flaying the skin off of the rest of the fingers. “This was for trying to kill me, this was for those two lizards in the tunnel, this one is for the giant spider… hmm, I’m afraid I’ll Have to amputate,” he continued on until there were no undamaged fingers left, then he went to cutting them off entirely, then worked on the hands until he reached the arms. The thing was a wreck, shaking like a meth addict in withdrawal and even sobbing. He had no pity though. This was necessary retribution.
“I take no pleasure in doing this,” he smirked a little knowing full well he took a slight perverse enjoyment in revenge. He’s been driven mad and chased through the dark old tunnels for far too long. Too many horrors battled, too much blood spilled, he had to put down this thing. What he went through was going to be thrown right back at it, and eye for an eye. He relieved the thing’s arms of the burden of having skin, ignoring the things screams and yelling of incoherent lizard babble. If it was pleading to its god to save it, those pleas would fall on deaf ears in his presence. It was in his domain, this was a dark hell and he is its crown prince.
Connor tried soothing the thing, petting its head mockingly, “now now, the flaying will stop when morale improves. Ooooh, what is this?” He found a small white strand poking out of the blue bloodied nub where its left hand used to be, “consider this one for the cut on the face. Don’t worry, it’ll only hurt a bit.” He pulled on it and the thing twisted and convulsed for a brief moment before it soiled itself and passed out. “Struck a nerve, did I?”
Hour 29:
He left a trail of dark blue blood wherever he walked. His body was covered on it, it was soaked into his clothes, and now he had an untreated black reptilian hide draped over him that was still dripping in blood as well. It was a crude thing he made as the tunnels were ever so slightly cool and walking around wet made him feel cold, so he skinned the thing and used its torso as a long vest, keeping the rest of the hide just in case. Around his waist was one of the ropes he used to tie the thing up and attached to it was the severed head of it, a sign to any other people in the tunnels to leave him alone.
This area was well lit and filled with random things, a very high traffic area if there was such a thing down here. He checked every hidey hole and every door, looking for a way out with his bloodshot eyes. He stabbed a remaining dark lizard thing to death in one room, leaving it uneaten as he was full from the one he recently tortured to death, and found a large egg in another room that he threw at a wall for the sake of it.
He was becoming agitated, searching doorways and rooms, doorways and rooms, just so many of them. It was repetitive and frustrating but he was slowly progressing upwards though, he knew it. Then he heard a large wooden object be slid over something then dropped, followed by footsteps and the sound of claws on stone. He followed the sound, creeping up on the unfortunate victim in the hopes that it had what he wanted.
When it rounded a corner and stared at him slack jawed, he laughed, “it is too late, surrender to your fate.” The black lizard thing looked down at the severed head on his hip, then back up at the two sets of steel talons pointing up at the ceiling. It tried running away, something highly unusual for many of these things, but it was too slow nonetheless. Connor grabbed it by the wings and promptly chopped them off before pushing it forward into a wall. It slumped down to the ground where he executed it with a stab to the spinal cord. Reasoning in his sleep deprived and maddened mind that the trophy of a head made it flee rather than attack him, he made short work of taking this one’s head as well and fixed it to the rope around his waist on the other side, making it two disgusting and morbid trophies bouncing around.
Around another corner was a short ladder, a set of stairs, and what looked like floorboards above it, definitely what that thing had just come from. He tapped on the wood a couple times and waited three seconds before going part of the way up and then striking it with the side of his fist so as to not stab it with his talons. The thing bounced up a few inches, so he pushed it all the way up and out of the way, climbing out into an old shed. This was it, he escaped. Connor kicked down the building’s door just to make sure, finding that the light of dusk or dawn was bathing a rolling field in orange light. He looked around, seeing a ruined building far off in the distance from the right side of the shed, and to his left was the figure of a man standing on top of one of the rolling hills. He could see long hair flowing in the breeze as he approached, then it started waving at him. He was too tired to care much over it though, he was no longer in danger of angry winged lizards and not trapped underground anymore. With a yawn, he slid down the side of the shed and onto the ground before passing out.
Hunter or Huntress 
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