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Maurice Marauder of Mount Titan (#8782)

Owner: 0x72F6…Ff5A

Play music while reading: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mhWdKvevQc&list=PL5mduOntyTSbBjBzuMDnWLnk1lmYLQ_NH&index=86

PARIAHS

Prologue

Strained steps shuffled over drops of blood. Ragged breathing faded into the moaning wind. Hair, still caked in grime, whipped violently in the air, dust and dirt stinging their eyes.

“HOW MUCH FURTHER?”

The wind nearly drowned out his voice.

“Keep…going,” came an exhausted reply.

Clouds roiled overhead as they rounded the first and smallest peak of the Great Wound. Scattered tufts of dead grass turned to jagged hornfels that stabbed at each step.

“There.”

As the mountain ridge gave way, their eyes settled on an otherworldly sight. A writhing black mass of darkness formed a wall several leagues long, wisps of black energy evaporating from its surface. The stories he heard as a little boy had been undone. It ebbed and flowed, flashed and rumbled, roared and consumed. It was static but sentient, an unknown force of nature laying claim to this realm.

“Are you sure about this?”

He looked at him, streaks of red dripping over veins of black.

“If you wish to find her, I must heal.”

He nodded, gripped the man’s arm more tightly, and helped him over the jagged rocks.

A bolt of lightning leaped from the darkness and forked into the darkened clouds above with a piercing screech and thunderous crack that reverberated in their chests. The scene before them was terrifying and powerful, wholly awesome but not of this world.

They hobbled cautiously toward the dark veil jutting into the sky. It had a texture unlike anything he had ever seen. Undulating ripples of darkness as if shadow, itself, became liquid. The closer they came, the worse it appeared. Shapes shifting in the dark ichor, unnatural yet familiar. Fearful, he turned away his gaze and looked to the dirt beneath his feet as he helped carry the dying man to their final destination.

“This is far enough. Now stand back."

The man stepped forward clutching his abdomen and knelt before the Great Wound, blood still dripping into the dirt. It was louder near the wall. Underneath the roaring wind and rumbling sky was a general hum in the air, or so he thought. Chanting emanated from the wall as muffled whispers and cries. The man matched the sounds, speaking in an unknown language. Lightning broke through the veil again, striking the ground nearby. The wall began to ripple, flowing outward from where the man knelt.

Asking for life from death is no simple task.

The chanting grew louder as the lightning became more chaotic, flashes of purple illuminating the dark ooze before them. The man slowly rose to his feet, struggling to keep his balance. He outstretched his arms to the tumultuous sky above…

“GREAT WOUND! HARBINGER OF UNDEATH, HEAR MY PLEA!”

The frequency of the ripples increased; the wind and thunder deafening.

“I COME TO YOU AND SEEK YOUR RELENTLESS POWER!”

Shapes formed in the veil. Hands struggled to free themselves, faces smeared across its surface in agony. The chanting from the veil grew even louder.

“GRANT ME THIS BOON, AND I SHALL BE YOURS FOREVER!”

What? But your promise…

A face formed out of the black ooze, its features gaunt and horrifying. A deep, unsettling laugh could be heard echoing all throughout the veil. Tendrils of dark slime separated to form a cavernous mouth, dripping with evil.

The man turned and looked at him with a wry smile,

“Thank you for your service.”

He turned back to face the hideous visage and stumbled forward into its gaping maw.

No! STOP!

He scrambled and reached for him…but he was too late. With a thunderous crack, the haunting face snapped its mouth shut around the man. A surge of black and purple energy pulsed through the face as it sunk back into the Great Wound.


Starring Warrior #8782

Music: The Mad Queen by Rok Nardin

Entered by: 0x72F6…Ff5A and preserved on chain (see transaction)