Nib

Us, Redux

I believe Beo has convinced me. I'll tentatively throw in my interest.

Betwixt the Eternal Light

@NewSun, edit has been made to show they're still in the cemetery.

Betwixt the Eternal Light

I'm not sure about where Rook, John, and Important woke up at. I assumed it was part of the cemetery. As for Artimus, she usually flies off to wherever Rook gets teleported to upon death.

Betwixt the Eternal Light

~-~

Lament the Dark

~-~

After tending to his former prey's wound, Rook was starting to stand on his own injured legs when the babbling had suddenly grew louder and clearer than before. He turned at the sound of a soft tapping, only to see... something dart back into the inky black shadows of the crypt with a hiss, away from the light of his lantern. His immediate reaction was to fire a bolt at the thing, but his shot just hit the head of the tunnel and clattered to the ground. Shaking his head, the hunter looked from the tunnel to the boy laying at his feet.

"Yeh saw that, right boy? The thing with two heads?"

A cold wind then came upon the two men who were so close to escape from the Broken Crypt, a frigid, bitter chill permeated the very stones that lined the shadowed walls. It was there amidst the darkness somewhere, stepping slowly and carefully, with a glint of madness in it’s very being; watching, waiting, preparing. It’s hands were slender amalgamations of bone and sinew, roughly spun into the shapes of spindly, serpentine fingers that waved independently in the vacant air of the tomb. One of its mournful heads quietly screamed devastating nothings, its amputated tongue slipping against sharpened teeth set in ancient stone. The other whispered phantasmagorical utterances that sailed through the faltering light like a knife upon the night; together their hideous verse instilled and cultivated a deep sorrow within the men it faced, as though it were speaking of a tragedy that no mere mortal could possibly understand.

”Together... Together... Separated... Until the end...”

The boy's damp face felt chilly against the wind that came. His eyes simply stared into the darkness as his face tightened into a grimace of fear. His hands moved on their own as they scrabbled for the journal, almost ripping it open as they fought to open to an empty page. The quill was pulled out of its slot and the boy's hands worked at a frenzied pace, almost slashing at the paper while he stared ahead in a trance.

The hunter pulled his cloak tighter about himself as a chill swept over him, his crossbow held loosely in his right hand still. He watched as the boy pulled out his journal and began to draw, of all things. His hand moved as if posessed across the blank page, ink flying from the tip, and his eyes were just locked onto the place where the monstrosity had appeared. The boy had clammed up, frozen with fear other than his hand that did the drawing. His left hand.Shaking his head to make sure she could still move, the hunter bent grab the lever from his pack and fit it onto his bow to reload a shot as quickly as he could. There was no telling when the thing that made this crypt its home would reappear and what it would do when it did.

Finally the boy's hand stopped, shaking as it removed itself from the tip of the paper. The boy blinked rapidly for a few moments, looking around and then back down at the paper, in shock. "I... I drew this?" he asked, eyes widening suddenly as he remembered the sight of the beast. He dropped the quill as he brought his hand back up to his forehead, grimacing again. "R-run. We need to run."

"Yer right about that, boy, but your one leg is banged up, and both of mine were clawed by a damn bone pile used as a puppet."

The boy slammed the journal shut, banishing its sight for the time being as he clenched his teeth, attempting to stand. "Skeletons moving. Two things merged together. This entire place. Madness. It's all madness. I just want to go home." The boy looked up at Rook, a look of melancholy covering him. "I couldn't control myself. I just stared while I used the wrong hand to draw it. Did you hear its lamentations? It was in my mind."

"Aye. I heard the thing's weepin'. As for going home, lad... I think we are. This land seems to be our home now, wherever we came from before or whoever we were before, we're just ants in this maze now. Better get used to it if yeh want to survive."

"John. My name is John. My surname is that weapon over there," the boy said as he stood up, eyes welling up slightly as he walked over to it, stooping down and picking up the great cleaver. "The image of cleaver. Still bloody, I never managed to clean off the blood. I... remember. I must've killed someone. God has punished us, hasn't he?"

The hunter looked at the young man as he stooped to pick up the great cleaver he ahd named himself after. It was as good of a name as any in this unknown land filled with mad men in rusted armor and now apparently two monsters stuck together and shoved in a crypt. Rook... the word came back to mind just like it did when he first laid eyes upon Artimus when he first awoke in this land of madness.

"Call me Rook. I'm not sure about that either, bo- John. Last thing I can remember is... a campsite, on fire, and something came at me through the haze. Then I woke up here. In a forest of stone."

"Like the bird?" John asked, regaining a bit of youthfullness and immaturity to his voice. "I'll have to meet your hawk out there. Make's sense you name yourself after a bird." John swung the cleaver in a large arc, clumsy and slow, showing he knew nothing about the sword. "I think I remember seeing a knight once. Had a big sword, nothing like this. It can't be much different from chopping with an axe, is it?"

"I'm not sure if I've named myself after the bird or the piece in that game the rich folk play. Chest, I think it's called? I don't know. Either way, call me Rook. Artimus is a beauty. I've had her... since I was little. I don't know about that, John. I'm not really a close up sorta fighter. I prefer to stay at a distance with my bow here," he patted the bow affectionately, as though it were a pet he held in his arms.

The cold wind began to return, filling the hall and giving both men gooseflesh over their arms. It howled through the halls with a truly eldritch cry deep into the bowels of the crypt itself. The whispers rose in their intensity once more, threatening to deafen the two of them. "S-steel yourself... I'ts coming..." John whispered, barely audible through the noise, his body shaking as he held tightly to the Cleaver, both hands wrapped around it.

Ever the hunter, Rook pulled the crossbow back up and aimed it at the tunnel entrance, ready to fire should the abomination show its heads yet again. Moments passed, almost seeming like an eternity down there in the darkness. The beast refused to reveal itself. "I... is it... taunting us?" John gritted his teeth before sucking in a gasp of air. Suddenly, he shouted, yelling loudly into the darkness, "SHOW YOURSELF, DAMN IT! DON'T LEAVE US HERE, YOU DEMON OF HELL."

Rook lowered his bow slowly and stared at his young companion as he shouted into the dark for the beast to show itself, themselves? The hunter soon saw his folly as the beast lunged forth from the shadows and lashed out, catching him in the side and sending him sailing through the air. He hit the wall of resting corpses and fell to the stone floor in a tangle of bones and cloak.

"R-Roo-" John gasped as the demon leaped from the darkness, too fast for a thing its size should have been. It stood at least double the size of John, the tips of its heads almost reaching the roof of the crypt. Its jaws snapped open and shut at a rapid pace, ready to tear flesh from bone as one of its crooked hands flew for John. He moved, yelling as he ducked beneath the demon, diving through its legs in a panic. He suddenly remembered the weapon in his hands, lashing out in a sick chopping motion towards the Lamentor as he went past.

His attack hit one of the abomination's legs, elicitating a scream of pain from it as John pulled his weapon out, dashing out of reach of another of its arms. The wound wasn't deep, but dark black blood slowly oozed out, dripping to the grimy floor. For a moment John stared, amazed he had even hit the beast. It felt pain. It could be killed. John knew that he had experienced much death in his life. If the beast was simply a beast, he could kill it. It was no swine or fowl, it was a beast that needed put down. Adrenaline flushed through his system as he grinned.

Meanwhile, Important peeked around the corner of the crypt, through the holes of his helm, he saw the vista of an abomination. The twisted form of two souls smashed into one, he thought. It held such a grotesque form that he once again considered simply returning to his place in the crypt and sleeping away until he could safely leave.

But of course, the voice that pleaded for him to save them returned. Familiar and fond, he felt compelled to listen to it.

With his blade in hand, Important stepped out from the corner and with practiced muteness, unsheathed his sword, and sprinted towards it. The moment before he would attack, he threw the sheathe in the opposite direction of his slash, and aimed to take its sight from one of its heads. He would have been a fool to stay put inside of its reach, so he continued forwards.

The hunter flailed his arms, attempting to untangle himself from the bones and folds of his cloak. When he finally managed to push the bones away and rip his cloak off of himself, the hunter stood to see an armor-clad person spriting at the beast and slashing at it with a short sword and John standing away from the beast, his cleaver covered with the inky black blood of the twin-headed behemoth. It was in his quick assessment of the crypt-turned-battlefield that he realized his crossbow was laying far from his reach; he had dropped it when the abomination flung him at the wall of corpses.

The Lamentor turned from delivering a quick death blow to the boy who had cut it so, hearing the footsteps coming towards it. The one who had first invaded its lair. The one that had evaded it for so long. "Important... Important. Grandeur. Falsity." one of the heads cackled as the sword swung close, but missed its mark as the demon reared back with inhuman speed. One of the heads suddenly stopped moving before starting to let out an ear piercing 'eeeee,' appearing excited.

It would certainly forget its lamentations, if only for a night.

It was as though the beast had resolved to steele itself for the oncoming conflict, it had known of the presence of three, but expected not cooperation, and had such expected an easy hunt - somewhat. But these insignificant souls had shown themselves to desire surival above all else, to deny the Lamentor its gratfying demonstration of dominance absolute within that broken place. It lept to the side, appearing to defy all logical rules, and once again into the velvety dark shadows where even its abhorrent visage would be nigh impossible to detect.

And then... the sound of the sharpening of a knife. The sound of tears being shed.
But it was ghostly, as if echoing from some other time and place beyond. The beast narrowly avoided the armoured newcomer's charge, its arm reaching from the darkness in a terrible arc and striking the newcomer from behind, sending him reeling into the Crypt walls with a metallic thud. It then rushed from the gloom, moving with such speed that it appeared to not even touch the ground, as though it floated through some arcane force. It was a blur, faster than the eye could follow, its spectral raiments following it slowly through the air, trailing it like a chain of smoke.

First, the Hunter. Gathered into the hands of the Lamentor and bound within its bony fingers, a grip tighter than an iron fist. He was raised into the air for a moment which seemed to slow and dilate with the fluctuating echoes of eldritch moans and the cries of struggle from mortal lips. The wound inflicted by the Cleaver-wielding man had already begun to close, the black blood that had bubbled forth from the wound had started to fizzle away in clouds of noxious gas; the scent of which appeared only to drive the Lamentor more mad than it had been previously. What had once been words had given way to senseless screaming that spoke of a most infuriating hysteria. It swung the Hunter through the halls, slamming him repeatedly against solid stone, each time the sound of bones crushing devolved more and more into the sound of pulverising thuds.

He would have screamed, should he had been given the chance.

The Lamentor dropped the Hunter, its two heads turning immediately to the Newcomer who had charged with a shortsword of mortal steel. The beast evaded a series of frenzied and skillful strikes, its arms and body twisting in ways that should not have been possible. With each attempt, it drew closer and closer, mockingly slowly, its mouths trying to form words of malice and spite. It straightened its arm towards Important, stretching its finger as if to point to the man.

"Fateful. Important. Good hearted. Innocent. Guilty. Couragous. Strong.

Its mouths stopped, both descisively snapping shut at the same moment; before - in perfect synchronisation - they spoke one more time.

"Dead."

The Lamentor pushed its skeletal finger through the chest of the assailant, coaxing a well of blood to erupt from his mouth before the life faded from his eyes entirely.

And then, only one remained. The boy, John Cleaver he had described himself as to the Hunter. It was a voice most familiar to the hunted that it spoke in one last time.
To John, the boy who wished simply to find his way home, it would have maybe even been soothing; as it silently stepped towards him, John could have sworn that the Lamentor assumed the voice of someone most dear, calling to him.

"Dearest John..."

And then - Darkness.

--------

With a panicked and simultaneous gasp, the three found themselves together, but no longer in the Crypt; eyes opening quickly. Within a circle of stones they were, each man knowing less of himself, closer to becoming Empty, a state so feared by the last sane wanderers of the land.

But John Cleaver perhaps saw something within the crypt that the others did not, and resting upon him now was a simple locket of gold, warm to the touch, as if it cast away the sorrowful land all around, conjuring forth an inner warmth that he had not felt in all his time within the Land Betwixt.

The hunter was the first to pull himself into a sitting position, looking around to see where he had awakened this time. He was surrounded by headstones, so he must still be in the cemetery. Sure enough, when he directed his gaze to the skies above he saw Artimus drifting lower and lower toward him.

Jumpchain CYOA

I've very recently gotten into a collection of Choose Your Own Adventure (CYOA) games called Jumpchain. For those of you who don't know what Jumpchain is, it's a collection of CYOA games set in popular fandom verses. You get placed there by some cosmic being who enjoys watching great adventures, but has no more to watch in this universe of ours and so chooses you to go on an adventure for his amusement. You can start in any fandom verse you want, and then at the end of the choices you make you choose then to either go back home, stay in the current universe you find yourself in, or to continue on to another fandom verse and more adventures. The goal is eventually survive in an outrageously OP universe like Warhammer 40k.

With that explanation out of the way, on to my reason for posting this thread. I would like to do two thing with this thread: I would like for users to stop by, post your selection of choices and then defend your survival in the current universe you're in or even write up a short story of your adventure in that world based on your choices. Anyone interested in this idea? If so the link to the Google Docs containing all of the Jumpchains can be found below.

To Jumpchain

Betwixt the Eternal Light

@NewSun, how big is The Lamentor exactly?

Betwixt the Eternal Light

The Song of the Crypt

His mind was sharper and more focused now than it had been since he had awakened in this world. He pushed the hunger and thirst he had been feeling since embarking on his long trek away from the forest down and away to focus on the hunt. And so, he sat and waited, holding himself up as much as he could in the crack with his arms so as to not crush his crossbow beneath him; it was an awkward position to aim in but he managed to maneuver the bow to aim straight down the crack and onto the stair beyond. Where it would strike his target depended entirely on the shape and size of it. If it were human in shape and around average height the bolt should strike somewhere around the legs; if not it could very well strike higher up the body the shorter it was. If his pursuer wasn’t humanoid, it was hard to tell where the bolt would strike the thing. He hoped it were at least human in shape. He did not wish to meet whatever devils lurked in the walls of the dead he found himself hiding within.

Soon he heard footsteps coming down the dark stairway and then a light brighter than the lantern he had placed on the steps came near his hiding place. He saw a shadow break the light while something pulled at his foot just as he squeezed the trigger of his bow. The string snapped forward, propelling the bolt and making the all too familiar noise that echoed off the walls and bounced around the crypt. The bolt flew as straight as possible and struck his target. The pursuer lurched forward and fell into the darkness, their lantern bobbing away after them as a tiny yellow dot in the blackness. Rook turned around to see what had pulled at him in the small tunnel only to see the skeleton he had kicked before hanging onto his boot and pulling at it, trying to drag him down the tunnel. It looked as though its lower half was hanging over an opening of some sort, but he was not concerned with what lay beyond the tunnel. He kicked at its head in panic, but it did little in the way of shoving the monster off and away from him.

Panicking, he pushed his crossbow out of the crack and pulled his hunting knife from his belt as it was the only weapon he had that could be maneuvered in the tunnel. The skeleton sank its fingers into his leg, stabbing into the skin and raking down as it gave another pull. The cuts were deep, but he ignored the pain as best he could and stabbed his knife awkwardly at the skull of the his attacker; the tip of the blade made contact, but to no avail. The skeleton continued pulling the hunter, stabbing its fingers into his skin each time he edged closer as if climbing a mountain with picks. Rook flailed his body about, trying to knock the fiend away, but its hold was too deeply rooted in his skin now. With nothing left to him, he began pulling himself back along the tunnel, still on his back with the skeleton attached to him by its fingers.

He fell out of the crack with a thud and sent his crossbow falling down the stairs and into the abyss of the crypt. In the open he was able to turn and twist until the skelton’s hold finally faltered, and it fell away, hanging out of the crack. Out in what light his lantern could shed, Rook finally saw that the skeleton was only an upper half, and where the lower half should be was what looked like a piece of darkness itself threaded up through the ribcage and arms. The skeleton he had kicked was being used as a puppet now to pull him in as a victim to whatever the puppeteer was. The skeleton flailed its arm in an attempt to grab hold of him again, but had managed to crawl out its reach. He watched, heart thumping and pulse racing, as the piece of darkness removed itself from the skeleton and slithered back into the crack, surely to await some other victim to crawl into the wall or to find some other hunting ground in the crypt. The bones now lay at the foot of the crack, a discarded fishing hook of whatever lived within the wall of the crypt.

Gingerly, the hunter got to his feet, blood dripping from the six or so puncture wounds on his legs. Fire shot through his legs from the wounds as he limped onward into the abyss of the crypt and toward his prey after snatching his lantern back. His steps were not as measured or soft, but instead sounded as though he dropped each foot as he walked. The hunger creeped back slowly, followed by the thirst he had been able to shove down until now. His crossbow had fallen down the staircase a good twenty steps with a loud clattering that still echoed and bounced down into the pit of darkness, chasing on the heels of the twang from his crossbow string. He stooped to gather his bow back up, pain shooting up his legs from the small movement, and then fitted the lever onto the body of the bow, pulled the string back into place, and then set a new bolt in the bow. He pressed on, a predator after its prey, or more accurately an escaped and injured prey after a more injured prey.

As he saw a soft light far below him, a gibbering of the most insane kind gradually grew until it sounded as if the walls themselves chattered away in the tongue of the insane. This sent shivers up his spine and caused him to come to a halt along the stairs. He listened to the mad gibberish, hearing it broken every so often by a slow tapping noise. Something had awakened in the crypt. Was it the puppeteer that had already assaulted him come to finish the job and claim its prize or something else living in these dark halls? Either way, he had to find his pursuer first and then either flee this place or hide from the roaming beast. So, with as much quickness he could coax out of his injured legs, Rook made his way down the staircase and toward the faint light from the lantern of his pursuer.

He stepped off the final step of the maddeningly long staircase of the crypt and set to scanning the area he now found himself in. It was just a dark as the staircase, but his lantern shone through as a beacon. What he could see was old stone set in the earth however far down he had walked into it and coffins lining the walls in neat rows, some of which looked as though they were opened and robbed from with their occupants hanging out here and there. There were also arched doorways leading off into the bowels of the crypt. It was near one of these doorways, Rook spotted the dark shape of his pursuer. He limped over to the shape, examining it from afar first; it looked to be a man in a dark coat with light hair. Something glinted in his lantern light near the man, a cleaver bigger than any he saw a butcher carry before. Ever the hunter, Rook took careful aim at the man as he limped coser, stopping somewhere around five feet out of the man’s reach.

“Why were yeh followin’ me?

Claim Your Signatures/Avatars!

It looks fantastic. Thank you.

Claim Your Signatures/Avatars!

Could you make me a signature with the following quote and image?

“A single dream is more powerful than a thousand realities.” - J.R.R. Tolkien

Image

Betwixt the Eternal Light

@c3p-0h, as I told Renny, Sun hasn't said anything about cutting of submissions.