Temptation and Madness

[Kasso]

Faintly glowing embers from torches that lined the inner caverns smouldered on in passive silence. The air was greasy and thick, thin tendrils of smoke still snaked along the ceiling, coiling out in search of the unreachable sky. Silence, was all that could be heard in the normally loud halls of the orcish people. The stench of burnt and rotting flesh mingled with one another and the pits were as ancient times, devoid of life.

The quiescence was disturbed by the a long, groaning howl deep within, where one of the few remaining greenskins still lived. Broken, tired and mortally wounded, the orc Thuzluk laid on the ground, only barely conscious as he blinked through blury eyes at the cieling, awaiting the end when he would go to the Orc gods side. Though he was disturbed to see a figure pause and loom over him, staring down at him with a sardonic grin. The woman spoke with gibbering words, unlike anything he had heard among his mortal foes in the past. He sneered and managed little more then a resigned grunt of protest. He heard her laughter, almost a distant echo as his vision faded and the walls seemed to bleed inky blackness. All at once he snapped back to reality and realized it was truely happening. From the walls poured black ichor, faces formed within all cackling and laughing at the orc, cursing his weakness and singing praise to some foreign entity.

"Do you know greenskin, why we're here?" The woman asked, learning down over him and pulling out a thin, razor sharp knife and gliding a finger across it, bright red ooze leaking forth from the tiny wound in her finger. Grunting, Thuzluk gritted his teeth and spat out the same words the tribes shaman had preached from the day of his birth. "We'z 'ere to fight, kill da elfs and bash in yer 'umie cities... You'z won't stop i', cause da boyz'll be back." The woman's echoing laughter continued, mirthlessly mocking the orc, though Thuzluk paid it no heed. "You know what's an interesting attachment? You hold it so close to your heart that I could compose an epic of its slightest fraction. That false god of yours, the entity to which you give your worship and praise for your food and your victories won." She leaned closer, her lips inches from his ear as her bloodied hand reached down and touched the orcs bare chest, where he could feel a sting of strange, ungilating pain.

"Your kind were born no different then men, or elves, dwarves... You're all callous plagues on reality, even this world itself, is a abomination, a land errected in silent mockery to the true powers of the universe. Your 'gods' as you would call them, all stole this world from its true owner..." The orc looked at the woman, wide eyed, his mouth open to curse her but he could not find the words, instead she continued. "But do not worry, change is coming, we have watched this world rot, and grow decadent, and your sanity blinds you to our pressence. But do not worry, I will reveal the truth of everything to you momentarily." He looked down to her hand, where he could see his stomach wretching and changing, bubbling like the surface of an oil slick as his skin popped and puss poured out across his flesh, tiny teeth and horns emerging from within. He made to scream, but she cooed to him, stroking his balding head with one hand with a motherly love. "Do not fret my love, you'll embrace your true self soon." Thuzluk continued to twitch and squirm as his eyes glazed over and the world around him seemed to be drank in before his eyes. He gasped but could find no air, blinked but could find no sight, his ears strained but he could hear nothing, only silence, and then distant, voices. He could hear the gibbering slowly growing, not unlike what that woman [what woman?] had slaughtered his people [who were they?]. The voices continued to grow louder, until he could feel their power thundering against his body, pounding at his head, time passed endlessly as he clutched his skull and made to scream, he rolled about in terrible, joyous agony, his own cries blended with callous laughter and added to the chourus of madness that was sung for only his ears to hear.


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Staring down at the body, the woman tilted her head as the flesh continued to contort and bloat, the orc shivered and mumbled to itself, its wounds did not heal, but instead slowly yawned open, mouths that gibbered and leaked spittle forming all across it. The woman remained unflinching as she curiously watched the process, her own eyes seemed distant as she looked upon the creature with envy, there it was lulled into eternal madness and ecstacy with her own master. She wrapped her arms around herself and closed her eyes, imagining what it would finally be like to join him herself, the cackling unending joy of existance between realities, caught between life and death like a marionette controlled by two hands. After a brief time indulging in her fantasy she slowly sank back into reality and stepped away from the twitching body, the seed had been planted and there was still much work to be done.