TAoDaN 4 - Chapter 29

Chapter 29: Towards the Setting Sun

We decided it best to give up on Danthinos after what happened that night.  In any case, we certainly weren't going back there any time soon.  But there still stood a long reach of land for us to cross, so the following morning we started off once again.  Fortunately, just a day after we found a small gas station and trading post along the way.  The store owner wore a big black cloak that masked his entire body, save a thick, fish-like tail that we could just barely see over the counter.  The store owner never moved from his chair, but sat patiently as we browsed the store's wares.  His raspy, chilling breath emitted a pungent smell of fish paste, and his cough was even worse.  The entire time we were there he stared at us through the dark shadow of his hood.  At one point as I was checking out the chocolate bars he dryly asked, "So, where are you fellas headed?"

Startled, I turned my head to look at him.  "Uh, we're headed toward Ceramia, sir," I answered politely.

"Ceramia, eh?  You folks got business with the Dark Ones?  I'd stick away from them and their country if I were you."

"Oh yeah?  Why's that?" I questioned while checking the price of a Grass and Nuts Chocolate Bar.

"The Dark Ones, they that hide themselves in the night of their continent, trust nobody.  They'd just as soon lock you up for murder as they'd bring you in for a cup of tea.  They sacrifice all visitors, nobody ever goes there anymore.  You'd be best to look elsewhere for whatever you're going to Ceramia for."  He finished his sentence with a dusty, cackling laugh.  "Unless you want to be sacrificed," he added.  The cloaked man slowly leaned onto the counter.  "Come here, boy.  Come here."  Hesitantly I shuffled over to the check-out counter, hooves clicking on the tiled floor.  I rose my ears in interest.  The cloaked man rose his arms and with one cloaked hand he pulled down the sleeve of his other.  I quietly gasped.  His arm was scaly with a fin membrane on the side and many dark red scars, but his hand was like a robot's.  It's fingers moved mechanically, lacking any fluid motion whatsoever.  I gulped and looked into his cloak where his head should have been but where instead there was only a dark shadow.  "You like it?" the old creature chuckled sarcastically.  "Now compare it with my other hand."  With his mechanical hand he pulled down the sleeve of his other arm.  It too was dry and scaly and scarred, but it had a dry, scaly, webbed hand to go with it.  Then with his scaled hand he pointed at his mechanical one.  "This used to be just like my other hand," the cloaked man said.  "Until I decided to take a trip to Ceramia.  I barely escaped the bloodshed one experiences there, but I failed to keep both my arms.  I have to say I was fortunate, though, because the rest of the people that went with me were diced into small pieces to season a salad with.  That's right, people reduced to nothing more than fleshy grains of pepper."  I started feeling ill.  I think the man could see it in my face because he started chuckling again.  "I had to take a plane all the way to New Mariner's to find a doctor that could heal my wounds.  It cost me more than I could afford.  I used to be an archaeologist.  Now I struggle to make a living running a general store and a gas station in the middle of nowhere."

"Why didn't you just go home?"

"I have no family to go back to.  My parents died when I was a teenager of a shark attack, my grandparents are all dead.  My brothers and my sister died in Ceramia, and my relatives can't stand to look at my disfigured flesh.  They get green in the gills just thinking about it.  I do too, that's why I wear this cloak.  In any case, I have no reason to go home.  And I have no way of getting there."

"Can't...  Can't you just walk?"

"Lad, not all races are gifted with legs for walking."

I fell silent.  My silence only lasted a brief period, though, because Neshae called me back to the chocolates.  "Dreyfus!" he beckoned.  "I found a chocolate bar labelled Chocolate Nuts Up Your Gra---"

"The grass and nuts chocolate bar!  Uh, yeah, I saw it.  I don't have any money, though, I hope Isee has some," I called back.  Fortunately Isee came with money, so we were able to purchase a whole bunch of supplies for the road ahead of us.  We also grabbed a large bag to put our garbage in so that we didn't litter.  Isee filled up three cantines--one for each of us--and we went on our way.  The cloaked man's words echoed in my head as we took our first steps out of the shade of the gas station.

-

Things began to take a turn for the surreal as we grew closer and closer to the Antarctic Circle.  The days grew shorter and shorter, to the point that it seemed we had less than eight hours of sunshine.  A great orange- and purple-colored horizon hovered in one direction, the extremely distant Titan Mountains in another direction, and a strange building we couldn't make out but that Isee said was the Zombo Capital stood far away in another direction.  Very little happened initially on our journey southeast.  It gave me time to reflect on things I wouldn't normally think about stranded in the middle of a vast desert.

Sometimes I wonder why don't go to the Shadow Realm more often.  And then I remember it is because it is so empty.  Well, everything is there that's there in the Above Realm.  But nothing has a mind of its own.  I suppose even my own shadow is mindless.  Being part kitsune I can converse with shadows should the need arise, but it isn't very fun because shadows are incapable of talking on their own.  Which brings up an interesting point, it is very silly that dark powers are usually called "Shadow" powers.  Shadows are incapable of hurting anything, which is why I don't use my kitsune form for offense.

Speaking of which, my third tail should be growing in soon.  My third tail grows in on my 18^th birthday, just a year away.  I can hardly imagine how bizarre that will feel.  It is already weird enough growing a second tail whenever I turn into a kitsune or my mixed form.  Having a third tail...wow.  Just wow.  And it means I'll have to cut another hole in my pants...  Though on the plus side, my shadow powers will be way better with a third tail.  I wonder if I'll finally be able to get my shadow to be intelligent?  And I wonder what else I'll be able to do.

That's the special thing about my kitsune form, it gets stronger the older I am.  And on top of that, I have an extremely longer lifespan as long as I'm in my kitsune form, which is pretty cool.  I guess I just struck it lucky, I could have been a mortal fox instead of a demon ghost fox.  Shame I can't do cool ghost stuff, otherwise I'd have it made.  And who knows, maybe I'll be able to emulate that once I get my fifth tail...

These things came to mind as we crossed the desert because I realized I hadn't been using my kitsune form as much as I would have liked.  It's my third-favorite forms after my deer and mixed forms, so normally I use it a bunch.  Whenever I want to just be alone for a while, for example, all I have to do is turn into a kitsune and sink into the Shadow Realm.  I wish I thought of doing that more when I'm in trouble...  But then again, running doesn't always solve everything.  Once I get my fifth or sixth tail, though, I should be able to attack shadows.  That will be handy if I ever get in a pickle...even though I'd be middle aged by then.  Anyway, I decided that once we got out of the heat I'd shift into my kitsune form and just hang out for a few hours that way.

About a week into our departure from Danthinos, we came across a fork in the road.  An undead sign pointed in both directions, telling us where they went.  It was in a language I could not understand, but Isee was able to translate.  In one direction, to the right, was a road leading to the southern country of Merland.  In the other direction, to the left, was a grim-looking path leading towards the orange- and purple-colored darkness.  The wind blew dust about and howled in my large ears as I looked down that road.  It seemed like few ever used it, because the path was practically untrodden.  Perhaps it hadn't even been touched for years.  Somehow I knew what road it was even before Isee translated it.  "..and this is Vinisi Road," he said.  I shuffled my hooves a bit in the sand and hardened mud.  The wind ruffled my hair and would have been refreshing if it wasn't full of dust.  Slowly I nodded, taking in our situation.  Beside me Neshae was overjoyed; my expression had told him it was Vinisi.  "Isee, what does 'Vinisi' mean?" I solemnly asked.

"It is Zombish for 'vile island.'"

I didn't reply but sighed deeply.  As we were farther from the equator things weren't as hot as they had been at the end of Stranyet's Corridor, I calmly shifted into my deer form.  It was the closest thing I could manage to a camel, and it looked like we'd be needing one.  If the Zombo Wastes had been deserty before it was nothing but flatland compared to Vinisi.  I could spy sand dunes in the distance, together with a dust devil or two.  "Isee, what do you know about the Vinisi area?" I asked, wanting to know as much as I could about the road ahead of us.

"Well, let me seeify...  The Vinisi Territory is part of the Egyptos Province, the most desert arealifia of the Zombo Wastes.  Most of the Egyptos Province sits in an eternicular sunset.  It is the darkness in the sky.  If my ruins are anywariful, it is there."  I nodded and shook my forelegs just to get them pumped with blood.  The supplies we picked up in Danthinos were getting heavy on our backs so I decided I'd just carry everything as best I could on my back.  So I'd need all the energy I could get.

We set out after a few more minutes of getting prepared.  Neshae was ecstatic that we were going somewhere dark.  I, on the other hand, had a chilling feeling in my antlers.  Something was waiting for us in this so-called Egyptos Province.

-

The day grew old as we neared the eternal sunset of Egyptos.  Skeletons we passed along the way chattered amongst one another about how they died.  I shivered at every story.  They involved disease, murder, sacrifice, almost any method of death you could think of.  There was many a time some sound behind us.  Usually I'd think we were being followed and like any deer my head would snap around and my eyes would dart here and there.  But every time I found the sound to be simply a natural phenomenon.  Perhaps the air wished to follow us wherever we went.  Or perhaps it was something in the air.  Every now and then we'd come across the ruins of some old stone structure which, though mostly buried in the sand, provided shelter during one of the many sandstorms that evening.  Sometimes I'd mistakenly believe something to be inside the ancient shelters.  Everytime, though, nothing would be there.

But sooner or later nighttime had to arrive.  We thought it helpful for Neshae, who had so kindly helped us in our latest pickle, to travel a bit in the darkness before sleeping.  So Isee whipped out a flashlight and we trudged in the deepening sand.  The spotlight of its beam actually made things worse.  The farther we carried on, the more nervous I got.  Many times I could have sworn I saw the faint glint of eyes just out of reach of the flashlight's beam, but as soon as I looked harder I found it to only have been a shiny speck of sand.  Once I thought I heard a mumble, and found it to be just some sand giving way to a rock's weight.

The skeletons were an exception to these misfindings.  Their eyeholes glowed red in the darkness, pitch black pupils following our movements.  They said nothing, though I saw their pupils dart to something behind us for a split second.  Whatever they had seen I could not catch a glimpse of.  I bleated in discontent and wished someone else would notice these things.  Being the only deer out of the three of us, I had the best hearing.  Good at times, but very bothersome at a time such as this.  I would actually have been more suspicious of the going-ons, but Neshae, who could see in the dark, seemed to be troubled by nothing at all.

That is to say, until that happened.

We had just set ourselves down to rest.  I was munching on a bit of salad, Isee was preparing to sleep, and Neshae was fooling around.  It seemed so quiet.  I hardly could have expected what happened next.  I was beginning to nod when my eyes caught another "glint" in the darkness.  I was fed up with false suspicions and was going to shake it off when I noticed it did not vanish like the others had.  And there were two glints.  "Neshae, what's that?" I sharply whispered, nodding towards the two glints.  Neshae looked where I was motioning towards and his eyes grew large.  "I don't know," he whispered back worriedly.  "I can see in the dark everywhere but in that direction.  I...I don't know what's out there!"  That was when the glints moved.  A skull vibrated and chattered as it did.

"Those who intrude on Zombo soil!" it suddenly and hallowly commanded.  "Heed this warning!  Leave our wasteland now, or suffer the wrath of the Great Ones!"

"What was that!?" Isee bolted.  He ran towards the skull and picked it up.  "What did you say!?" he quickly demanded.  The skull fell silent and ceased moving.  I quickly looked for the glints and only managed to see them for a second before they vanished.  I wasted no time in galloping towards where they were.  I called over Neshae with the flashlight and he illuminated the spot where the glints had been.  There were few markings, but I could tell enough from them that whatever it had been had gone beneath the ground.  An eerie chill hovered in a small radius around the spot.  A chill that not even I could get rid of.

-

Our next day was not a good one.  The strange intruder seemed to have buddies, and every now and then we would each swear we saw one, only to find ourselves either mistaken or too late to catch a glimpse of it.  What was very troubling was that both Neshae and I were very...hindered whenever we attempted to get close to one of the mysterious things.  Last night he had been unable to see in the dark when he looked towards one, and today he found his Fire Blade would not ignite whenever he was trying to get the jump on one.  I panicked when I tried to surprise one as I discovered I couldn't transform; until we left that little area I was stuck.  And my ice powers wouldn't work.  You wouldn't believe how good it felt to stretch my long dragon neck after being stuck in my deer form.

I'm pretty sure by mid-day we were officially in the Egyptos Province.  The sky never brightened, staying in a purplish-orange hue characteristic of desert sunsets.  One spot in the sky, in the very direction we were headed, held the darkness of night on the horizon.  A sinister cloud of darkness seemed to twist and turn from the black horizon.  I could only guess it was our destination; usually the bleakest, most gloomiest places were where we were headed.

Needless to say, Egyptos was a very astounding place.  Sand fell from holes in the sky, piling and creating "sand rivers" shifting on until being sucked up into other sky holes.  We occasionally passed bland pyramids, great sights for Neshae and I to see.  Great statues of the planet Uranus stood in their tan splendor, lining the paths to the ancient triangles.  Here and there hourglasses floated, suspended in the air by some unknown force.  When I tried to take one it moved away from me.  No matter how far I reached, it would not come closer.  Every now and then we'd come across areas where apparently lightning struck the desert sands: sheets of glass sat like icy ponds daring us to slip and slide across.  Through the glass you couldn't see the ground or some underground chamber; instead we saw outer space.  If we weren't so troubled by the mysterious visitors I probably would have gazed at those glass ponds for hours.

Our journey was brought to an abrupt halt by a vast canyon.  According to Isee it was known as the "Wounded Canyon" and I could see why.  Cautiously looking down the canyon's cliff I saw fast-moving red water at the canyon's bottom.  Fast enough that if we fell down the swift current would have swept us half a mile away before I'd be able to change into an orca and slowly go upstream.  Considering, of course, I wasn't diced by the rocks.

"Wounded Canyon's water, the Bleeding River, flows from a small inlet nearior the bottom of Erar's Lake," Isee lectured.  "The inlet lies by the territorial waters of Tyrannus, the God of Violence.  It is saidingted that the water is stained by the blood dripping from Tyrannus' jaws.  The canyon is home to many differentical species of sharks and crocodiles, both above and under the water."  I gulped and nodded.  I could see he was right; there were so many shark fins poking out of the water that I could see them from way up at the top of the canyon cliff.  "And it gets better," Isee chuckled, seeing my reaction.  "I'm sure you're wondering where they can findify enough food to survive."  He bent down to pick up a rock with a hoof-hand and then he threw it as hard as he could over the river.  Just a second after it started its journey over the river, a huge crocodilian head shot up from the river far below and caught the rock in its mouth.  The head was attached to a neck reaching all the way back down into the river.  The head returned down under the water as quickly as it came.  "One of the Bleeding River's greatest dangers is the Elastodile," Isee explained.  "A massive crocodile with an incredibilically elastic neck.  All it needs to do is lurk in the waters, watching, and as soon as something flies or jumps over the canyon it launches its head, which reaches the top of the canyon in half a second and comes back down as if on a bungee cord.  Herds of zombues need to cross this canyon every day in search of food and shelter.  They jump across, so the elastodiles snag one or two zombues, and any zombues that don't jump far enough are devoured by the other denizens of the river."

I groaned at the sound of it.  "Isee, Neshae, we have a problem," I sighed.  "Look," I explained, pointing at the expanse of the canyon.  "Not a bridge in sight."