Patreon LogoYour support makes Blue Moon possible (Patreon)

Forbidden Temple of the Great Falls

Status
Not open for further replies.
"You had not thought to mention this before the burning of the tainted bodies commenced? Surely your mind is not yet that far gone?" The gryphon angled his head upwards, his beak slightly opened. It almost looked like a grin.

"I am desecrating them. What is pertinent is that they are not men. Most would say that our fallen have earned their rest, and need pay no more. Would you give so much once you have already given your soul?"
 
"Does the giving of anything else even matter, after the magnitude of such a thing as a soul? Would you equate the body and soul as being of equal importance? I suppose I should not expect more out of such a tainted creature whose own body is twisted and grotesque, and whose soul is most surely forfeit." Valetni said dismissively.
 
The creature's bizarre posture didn't change an inch at Valetni's retort, its 'grin' holding true. But his voice took on a tangible slant of malice, different wholly from the regal indifference he oft projected.

"Do not mistake my interest for disdain, old man. You are fascinating to me. I have been told humanity is seen through deed, not flesh; that I, despite my form, remain a man. It is something I've endeavored to uphold through aid to others, through pennance. And yet, you..."

The creature lowered its head to sniff at the air surrounding Valetni.

"You drape yourself in misery and macabre; you dabble in poison and butcher the bodies of your kin under the guise of progress, but you are still called a man. To do any of what you do would see me branded more a monster than I am now, and I would surely be killed..."

He paused, considering.

"...You are fortunate to be allowed such indulgences by virtue of the shape you take. Careful that you do not lose it."

The creature plunged its beak back into its meal, and was silent.
 
"You would do well to not mistake humanity as a prerequisite for being human." Valetni said. He sorely wished he had engaged the creature in conversation prior to this point.

People were interesting.

This creature was Fascinating

"As for my activities, they are my own. I'd invite you to keep your...beak out of my affairs, unless they concern you, or you are willing to volunteer yourself for the place of honor upon my table." Valetni said, as he began to walk away.

On a whim, the origins of which he did not know, he set his course towards that of the infirmary.
 
The infirmary was, as expected, quite a busy place to be, with serfs, Elia and a few medically apt Hellguards doing their best to soothe pain of wounds of their patients.

Elia, upon Valetni's arrival, threw the latter a questioning glance before setting back to work, Blake having taught her that questions during work should only be limited to the patient.
 
Valetni would soon find the one whose life he saved unconscious, though her smaller wounds tended to, in a bed to his side, besides that of commander Kurze, incidentally, her husband, apparently having been released from whatever duty he had been committed to for a few minutes, sitting beside her.
 
Valetni approached the bed. "How's she doing?" He asked the husband, doing his best to inject a note of sincere concern into his voice. He figured the Hellguard of the outpost would be more predisposed to see him in a better light than Belatia had. After all, his deeds since arrival had been nothing short of heroic.
 
Staring up at Valetni with nothing but thankfulness bordering on reverence, the man responded "Oh, brother Valetni, how good to see you, here, let me get you a chair." sitting up from his own, he adjusted it for Valetni to sit upon.

Looking back at the unconscious form of his wife, the man continued "Sister Elia says she'll be fine if she gets rest for the next few weeks, though don't know if she's going to go through on that. She doesn't like sitting still for long times..."

Reverting his gaze back at Valetni, the man appeared flustered for a moment "Oh, sorry, should have done this sooner and to the man who saved my wife no doubt. I'm Marcus Lestrange, husband of Atris." he offered Valetni his hand.
 
Valetni shifted his cane to the crook oh his arm, clasping the man's hand with his right and placing his left hand on the other man's shoulder, guiding him back to his seat.

"Could I have done anything less?" Valetni said, "I'm just glad I could have been a help, I just wanted you to know, my prayers are with you in these troubling times, and with your wife for her speedy recovery." Valetni said in a voice loud enough for Kurze to overhear, without it being obvious.

"How are you holding up?" Valetni asked Marcus, playing the role of a benevolent monk of buzziah.
 
"I... I'm fine, brother monk, thanks to my wife still being alive, thanks to you of course. Uh, do you need anything, I can't stay here much longer, got work to do." Marcus replied.
 
"I completely understand," Valetni said with a compassionate smile. "Your thanks is enough for me, doing the work of good is reward enough in itself." Valetni patted the man on the shoulder. "Remember, one good turn deserves another, I will keep you and your wife in both mind and in my prayers."
 
She wandered forwards, looking up at the shrine.

The eyes from the tall bronze statue stared down at her, she dragged her eyes down the altar passing incense, and iconography before coming to rest at the bottom, several small candles were burning on a low rock shelf, raised only a few inches from the floor.

"I-I'm sorry I haven't talked to you for so long..." she small girl whispered.

"I didn't know, really, I just-just, I just thought it'd be a few hours, a day maybe, I-I didn't mean to ignore you."

Tears welled up in her eyes and began running down her face, retracing the paths they had taken at the funeral.

"I-I-I" the girl's sobbing drowned out her words as her entire body shook.

This carried on for several minutes, the candle flame flickering away in front of her, she eventually slowed down, her body becoming still.

As the tears dripped onto the floor the young girl spoke again, the noise she let out a barely audible whisper from her lips "I'm sorry I left you alone..."
 
Valetni merely nodded to the man as he left, before turning to look for Elia. Catching site of her, he caned his way to her position. "What's the general situation here?" He asked in a low voice once he was close enough.
 
Not looking up as she inspected the stitches of comander Kurze's leg-stump, Elia answered "One torn out leg, just as you can see here with him, then there are two whose breastplates got quite brutally slammed in, causing broken ribs that almost punctured their lungs. Another one got a very nasty cut across his throat, almost bled to death. You saw to Lestrange's life already. And then there's Herdpack who lost one of his eyes when his helmet got bashed in badly. Add to that, minor lacerations on limbs and throats, those beasts mindlessly tried to tear apart anything they could reach as quickly as possible."
 
"I see..." Valetni said thoughtfully. Already, he was concocting a plan in his head. "Herdpack lost an eye you said, is he conscious?"
 
Gesturing to the man in question, who was currently eating a bowl of oatmeal, Elia replied "He's quite sturdy, though he just woke up, you can talk to him if you want."
 
"Alright, remember to watch out for infection." Valetni called as he caned his way over the wounded hellguard.

"Soldier, how's the eye feeling?" He said kindly.
 
Looking up from his meal, the soldier replied "Good day to you, brother Valetni, not so much feeling, it's gone after all my head's still pounding something fierce but it could be worse. I'll be able to travel again by tomorrow, Elia assured me. Can I ask, I remember you as quite the one who shied from company and rather kept to his own devices, why are you here all of a sudden?"
 
"I have a professional interest the workings and whatnot of the infirmary." Valetni said. "Besides, if you guys all died, who would there be to protect me?" He joked.

"Regardless, I have a question for you. Do you perhaps remember how brother Zato lost his arm? And then had it restored to him?" Valetni asked of the injured man.
 
"Huh..." the older Hellguard thought for a moment "I recall there being an incident in the temple no less than three months ago or so, brother Johnson studied an artifact and said study went horribly wrong. I wasn't on duty in that part of the temple at the time, but I know that that's where brother Zato lost his arm, though I've been told sir Morr and sir Leonard, who's been in coma since then, were there too and had to be brought to the hospice thereafter...." he trailed off in thought.

Shifting in his memories further, he went on "I remember that brother Korsarro did some bizarre shenanigans before brother Blake took the wounded under his care, though brother Zato, along with that hugeman and brother Wolfram went to search something in the reliquary, after which brother Zato emerged with his new metallic hand."
 
"Mary, are you alright?" Zato stepped closer to the sobbing sounds. He didn't expect Mary to get this emotional from simple prayer.

"Mary, it's alright, dear" he reached out to where he was pretty sure Mary was.
 
Valetni removed the golden eye he had taken from the madman they had encountered, holding it up so that the one eyed knight could see it. "This presumably operates on a similar principle." Valetni paused. "It could quite possibly return your sight to you."

Valetni took a deep breath, getting into the persona he had chosen to adopt. "In the interests of full disclosure, I have no idea what the potential side affects of an implantation would be, you obviously came eye to eye with the crazed subjects last night." He paused. "On the other hand, brother Zato has had no ill effects from what I have observed so far, and both these items share an obvious ancestry. It could be as simple as a strong will, an armor of contempt, as it were, is all that is needed to keep at bay any taint." Valetni looked the wounded hellguard in the eye.

"I will not make the decision for you, it is quite possible to live a life with only one eye, though a greatly diminished one, and I understand if you feel that your will would not be sufficient." Valetni coughed.

"I will leave this with you," He said, dropping the golden eye onto the bed within easy reach of the hellguard. "For brother Zato, it was as easy as plug and play." He idly tapped the cane on the floor. "I leave this with you, what you do with it, destroy it, use it, or simply keep hold of it for the forseeable future, that is up to you." He leaned forward to clap the hellguard on his shoulder. "I wish you the best in whatever course you decide to pursue."
 
Staring at the eye for a moment, Herdpack's brain set to work calculating the chances of the effects consisting of him either returning to the state of a fully functional human being, or becoming an insane murderous psychopath based on brother Zato having received his replacement from the reliquary under the special supervision of the headmonk Wolfram while brother Valetni had extracted his directly from an already crazed madman to be around...

fifty to fifty.

Yeah... he liked his sanity. He also liked his arms as they were right now. He liked his skin too, see? So...

"I... think I really need to decline that offer, brother Valetni." he responded as he, forcefully, averted his gaze from the golden eyeball and resolutely began to eat his oatmeal again.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top Bottom