Entitas Writes

017 - Bone Pit

Thirteen against one, plus however infinitely many undead can happen here, are not odds Solana wants to fight. But she can’t exactly do nothing. She decides to lay low, wait it out a bit, and see what their plan is. She tries to listen in on anything they’re talking about…

It’s hard to make out what’s being said, but it’s definitely Kjeld talking. Maybe it’s not entirely spoken language? But some things are definitely clear: something about hate, and a whole lot of power and empowerment and strength and all that. This doesn’t sound good. Solana rummages through her supplies, she must have something that’d be of use here… well, there’s a big ol’ flint rock, and with a bit of cloth here she has a sling. She can sling this rock right at Kjeld and get him good! Swing, swing, swing, launch, and…

…slips out, hits the railing…

…tumbles to the ground, bounces at the bottom to head off the platform…

…and loudly thuds and tumbles a bit more at ground level.

Oh, no.

“Who’s there?”

13 faces look up to see her.

“…YOU?”

Solana tries to keep calm, which ultimately ends up looking bafflingly cheery. Hi there! You’re exploring in here too, huh? That’s right, she’s just an explorer, exploring.

“You need to leave. Now.”

Wait! What are you guys up to here? Is there some evil undead to fight?

Kjeld pauses.

“I’ll show you what we’re up to. You can be right next to me when it happens.”

Four guards, two up each stairs, approach Solana. This is not the way she wanted to get close, but with four swords approaching her, it doesn’t look like she has much of a choice. Surrounded, the guards escort her down the steps. Solana stands between the altar and the bone pit, with Kjeld at the other side of the altar, and six guards to each side. No real way to flee whatever happens here…

“To my understanding, a great force was put to rest here, within that pit you see before you”, Kjeld begins. “We will awaken it, control it, and have it bestow its power upon us”. Oh, this is sounding all not kinds of good. “And to appease it…” four guards, two to each side of Solana, force her down on her knees. “…I will offer it fresh bone”.

Kjeld begins speaking, some foreign words, but Solana has no interest in listening. Well, this is it. A crazy gangster man found incredible power, she barged in headstrong as always, and now she’s going to be eaten by some horror. She went through a lot of crazy stuff, but this is it. Alone, probably forgotten, Olgar’s Stand is probably going to fall, and who knows what else will at this point. She could have went for help first, got backup, something, anything.

This is all her fault.

The pile of bones begins moving, gently, filling the air with clattering and cracking to go alongside Kjeld’s steady speech. The undulations give the mass a near fluid appearance, rippling, forming a large mound before rippling to the edges and back.

“It is here! I am who has restored you! I offer you death, and bone, for your ever-swelling form! Behold, my first gift: this woman!”

Solana stares, wide-eyed. The mass looks to almost have control of itself. With a loud snapping, the skeletal mass surges towards her and the group like a wave of horror! No, now or never! Not like this! Solana steels herself at the last minute, and leaps from her position to try and get out of the way.

There are screams all around her, her body wracks with pain from the sentient bone piercing, crushing, doing everything it can to destroy the flesh covering its prize. However, Solana forces herself out of the very edge of the wave she was caught by. The soldiers next to her, however…

“What are you doing? Stop!”

Kjeld starts shouting in mystic tongue again. A few of the soldiers by his side make a break for the stairs, the ones staying by him readying their arms. A second surging wave, larger than the one that tried to envelop her, heads towards that remaining pocket of men. Solana wisely follows the soldiers that chose to escape. She hears screams and wet crunching. She doesn’t bother to look back.

An amorphous tendril of skulls reaches to this upper level, and lashes out at Solana. Rather than any sort of wrapping, it simply… masses, around her. Struggling briefly, she muscles her way out of the skulls, many of them disintegration at the force show of force. But the horde of bones is becoming clearly making its way up the staircase… she does NOT want to see if it’s completely submerged the ground level.

Close to the end of the stairs, a solder stares her down. With a cry for revenge, he charges at Solana, no doubt intending to make her a victim of the bones alongside Kjeld. An attempt to sidestep goes awry, and she gets tangled up with him. A quick kick ensures that he, not her, meets his fate in this dungeon.

She’s reached the second level! Now she just needs to run around this perimeter to… there are some guards pushing at some stone, as though... is that actually a doorway? That they’re now trying to close? Oh no, no no no no. Sprinting like she’s never sprinted before, Solana hurdles and maneuvers over and around stray bone and skull to catch up with the soldiers. Don’t leave me in here!

It’s too late. The skeletal mass is right behind her. The soldiers look more desperate, but eventually abandon their plan and start running as well. Into the statuary she goes…

…Which is alive with action. The statues begin moving! Shields up, weapons ready, the statues adjust their positions into a new formation. A small gap is present: Solana makes a break for it. They make no effort to stop her. Behind the line of animated stone, Solana turns around.

The statues move with stunning quickness, striking down bone as it approaches. Even when the wall of undeath is meters high, it never gains purchase against the guardians.

She made it. She’s safe… for the most part. Wounded, more than a little shattered, low on supplies, Solana doesn’t exactly slow down in making her way back up and out of the caverns. Hopefully she can catch up to the remaining soldiers… and extra-hopefully, they don’t want to kill her either.