Phasmus
First Post
Scene: All is dark. The only sound is that of a string section playing an ominous chord... A woman's voice speaks; cultured, mellifluous...and audibly afraid.
The dreams started some time ago. Sometimes I see things that have happened...
Images begin rising from the darkness, wavering around the edges as though viewed in a calm pool of water.
Gloomy underground tunnels and caverns...full of blank-eyed creatures both human and otherwise. A tall, thin, monstrous thing glides past, mauve tentacles waving with satisfaction as it leads a pair of umber hulks past. They bump into whoever's eyes we're looking through as they pass, knocking the field of view around to face a decorative shield on the wall. Reflected there is a young woman's face, haggard and thin, but still pretty...despite the blank, mindless stare in her striking silver eyes...
The image shimmers, vanishes, is replaced...
Another illithid is standing, its arms protectively curled around itself as ghostly white humanoids circle it, tearing at it with their ethereal arms, burning it with their hate...
Sometimes I dream of where we've been. What we've accomplished. Who we've saved.
A wizard stands over a stone table, with a human monk lying unconscious on it. With a wave of his hand and some spoken words...the human form begins melting, shifting...becoming something else. Something unspeakable.
A horde of antlike things comes galloping out of the underbrush, the sound of their feet like a hideous, bloodthirsty howl. There is a place of sanctuary ahead...a tree...but the gnashing mandibles draw ever nearer, and the tree stays stubbornly, maddeningly, on the horizon...
A wooden door on some kind of huge caravan wagon. It opens, revealing a well-stocked study within. Books and loose scrolls and rolls of parchment litter the air. Candles give the place a jovial, warm glow. Sitting behind the well crafted wooden desk is...a monstrosity made of metal. A hulking, armored form with a gratelike faceplate that completely covers whatever is beneath it. When it speaks, it is a dischordant cacophony of a dozen voices speaking, moaning, screaming in unison, "Welcome."
A grotesquely decayed humanoid body, feasting on what appears to be a young boy's corpse. It looks up, grins, and says, "Don't worry, plenty left for all!"
A terrible ghostly spectre made of shadow and hate, with burning red eyes. It swoops down, shrieking, only to be deflected by the swipe of a dagger who's dark blade seems to ooze malice. From out of that blade a black smoky form begins to issue...
Sometimes of those we've failed.
A translucent elven woman with hate-filled eyes, hovering over a snow-covered rocky landscape littered with wooden remains, opens her mouth to an inhuman width, and begins to scream...and the sound of it peels flesh from bones, rips souls from bodies...and the world begins to go black...
An illithid rears out of the darkness, and lunges forward, tentacles writhing eagerly, as dark lumbering shapes around it close in.
An elf, chained to a stone wall, begins sobbing and crying in terror as the blue tattoos that cover her skin flicker and turn red...and screams and roars begin emanating from outside the cell door.
A man that seems to be made of slick, liquid oil dashes madly down a cavern tunnel, where the flaming purple walls writhe and convulse around him. He is incanting madly, reaching out...and a vast maw is pursuing close behind...
An obscenity with a giant eagle's body, and a twisted parody of a stag's head launches itself upward out of an elven home amidst a great forest...and there is a woman's scream as its carnivorous teeth find flesh.
Every night, they come. Every night, they haunt my sleep.
An elf man, youthful in appearance, but with gravity that can come only with centuries, holds up a crystalline stone. It flares with light, and projects something into his eyes. His aquiline features pale, and the stone clatters to the table from his nerveless fingers. The wire crown around his forehead glitters as he rises and glares balefully down, ready to pronounce his judgement...
A black ship of incredible size powers through waves nearly as high as it is on a storm-tossed ocean. Its mast flies a pirate's banner, and from its deck leap five figures...into the churning, pitch dark seas.
All goes black...until a light flares. And revealed in that magical blue-white glare is a ghastly pale-white fish the size of a small whale. Four tentacles writhe around a clacking beaklike mouth. The light goes out.
A gigantic tsunami of bones sweeps over a forest, grinding and consuming all in its path.
A looming iron golem bends over, striking at something with a spiked metal fist.
But the worst ones...the ones I hate most...
A demon, wreathed in flames and bearing a sword made of the same, screams in agony and terror as wraithlike tentacles spring out of the ground and envelop it.
An illithid steps out of the shadows in a darkened alley, surprising a red-haired elf of incredible beauty. She cries out and leaps forward, dealing it a vicious blow with her rapier. But it raises one mauve hand, calling forth green and black scintillating energies. The elf gasps in terror and tries to jump away...but too slow. Too slow. Long fingered, slimy digits grasp her shoulder firmly. The sickly lights spread over her body...and she screams...and vanishes.
Five people stand in a room with a slack-jawed elf. The elf is chanting in a voice like thunder, and the room's walls are covered in faintly glowing arcane sigils. Tiny, insectile things are scurrying from out of the elf's mouth around his face as he incants. The spell grows...reaches its climax...and the walls fade to transparency, revealing innumerable writhing, squirming jet black worms...as though the room was merely a cubicle floating in a sea of leeches.
An illithid lies lifelessly on the ground. On the back of its head are two straight scars making an X. A foot cautiously reaches out and pushes it over...there's a gasp of horror. Its hands are tied with purplish tentacles. Its face has only four bleeding stubs around its maw.
The last one fades away.
...are the ones that show me what might still be coming.
The view zooms back, exposing a dark orb in a dark sky. There is a corona off to one side, as though the sun were in a state of eclipse. The surface of the orb is slightly glossy...as if covered with ice. As it turns, we see that this globe is in fact the world itself. The northern continent has a lake that looks horribly like an eye...and from farther south, things begin rising out of the frozen obsidian seas. Great towers, or something like it. Each one must be miles across, and swiftly growing upwards, away from the surface. We continue to pull back, and abruptly the awful truth can be seen.
The 'towers' are in fact tentacles...four of them. They begin to undulate loathsomely in space around a crater that opens in the center of them, deepening into a mouthlike cavern. The 'eye' glazes over, becoming the featureless white of an illithid's.
There's a gasp of horror, and the scene shifts abruptly to a woman sitting up straight in bed, though we cannot see her features clearly. The view pans in closer, coming around towards the table. The woman reaches for a lamp at her bedside with a shaking hand. The view comes in close on the lamp.
In this way, I suppose, being awake is no different than being asleep.
The lamp lights. We catch a glimpse of long, slightly curved claws on the fingertips as they're pulled away. The view starts pulling back.
It's that image that drives me. No matter what might get in my way. It gives me the imperative that keeps me going, though all hope seems lost.
Finally we see her face. It is clearly the same woman as from the very first image; the image of the illithid slave woman. She is no longer raddled by hunger and mistreatment, but her face is eerily changed. It seems to be made of flexible, glittering gold, and there are curious ridges above her eyes, circling around her temples. Her eyes are still silver, but are nothing like human now. They are chrome orbs, marred by vertical oval slashes, like a cat's pupils. Her lips peel back from her mouth in a snarl, and it's like looking at a shark's grin.
I will not let that dream come to pass.
The light goes out...though the unsettling image of those reptilian eyes lingers in the darkness for a moment longer.
---
The Chronicler has returned.
The story continues.
Doom awaits.
Vitis Chronicles: The Rise of the Illithid
Previously in Vitis
The dreams started some time ago. Sometimes I see things that have happened...
Images begin rising from the darkness, wavering around the edges as though viewed in a calm pool of water.
Gloomy underground tunnels and caverns...full of blank-eyed creatures both human and otherwise. A tall, thin, monstrous thing glides past, mauve tentacles waving with satisfaction as it leads a pair of umber hulks past. They bump into whoever's eyes we're looking through as they pass, knocking the field of view around to face a decorative shield on the wall. Reflected there is a young woman's face, haggard and thin, but still pretty...despite the blank, mindless stare in her striking silver eyes...
The image shimmers, vanishes, is replaced...
Another illithid is standing, its arms protectively curled around itself as ghostly white humanoids circle it, tearing at it with their ethereal arms, burning it with their hate...
Sometimes I dream of where we've been. What we've accomplished. Who we've saved.
A wizard stands over a stone table, with a human monk lying unconscious on it. With a wave of his hand and some spoken words...the human form begins melting, shifting...becoming something else. Something unspeakable.
A horde of antlike things comes galloping out of the underbrush, the sound of their feet like a hideous, bloodthirsty howl. There is a place of sanctuary ahead...a tree...but the gnashing mandibles draw ever nearer, and the tree stays stubbornly, maddeningly, on the horizon...
A wooden door on some kind of huge caravan wagon. It opens, revealing a well-stocked study within. Books and loose scrolls and rolls of parchment litter the air. Candles give the place a jovial, warm glow. Sitting behind the well crafted wooden desk is...a monstrosity made of metal. A hulking, armored form with a gratelike faceplate that completely covers whatever is beneath it. When it speaks, it is a dischordant cacophony of a dozen voices speaking, moaning, screaming in unison, "Welcome."
A grotesquely decayed humanoid body, feasting on what appears to be a young boy's corpse. It looks up, grins, and says, "Don't worry, plenty left for all!"
A terrible ghostly spectre made of shadow and hate, with burning red eyes. It swoops down, shrieking, only to be deflected by the swipe of a dagger who's dark blade seems to ooze malice. From out of that blade a black smoky form begins to issue...
Sometimes of those we've failed.
A translucent elven woman with hate-filled eyes, hovering over a snow-covered rocky landscape littered with wooden remains, opens her mouth to an inhuman width, and begins to scream...and the sound of it peels flesh from bones, rips souls from bodies...and the world begins to go black...
An illithid rears out of the darkness, and lunges forward, tentacles writhing eagerly, as dark lumbering shapes around it close in.
An elf, chained to a stone wall, begins sobbing and crying in terror as the blue tattoos that cover her skin flicker and turn red...and screams and roars begin emanating from outside the cell door.
A man that seems to be made of slick, liquid oil dashes madly down a cavern tunnel, where the flaming purple walls writhe and convulse around him. He is incanting madly, reaching out...and a vast maw is pursuing close behind...
An obscenity with a giant eagle's body, and a twisted parody of a stag's head launches itself upward out of an elven home amidst a great forest...and there is a woman's scream as its carnivorous teeth find flesh.
Every night, they come. Every night, they haunt my sleep.
An elf man, youthful in appearance, but with gravity that can come only with centuries, holds up a crystalline stone. It flares with light, and projects something into his eyes. His aquiline features pale, and the stone clatters to the table from his nerveless fingers. The wire crown around his forehead glitters as he rises and glares balefully down, ready to pronounce his judgement...
A black ship of incredible size powers through waves nearly as high as it is on a storm-tossed ocean. Its mast flies a pirate's banner, and from its deck leap five figures...into the churning, pitch dark seas.
All goes black...until a light flares. And revealed in that magical blue-white glare is a ghastly pale-white fish the size of a small whale. Four tentacles writhe around a clacking beaklike mouth. The light goes out.
A gigantic tsunami of bones sweeps over a forest, grinding and consuming all in its path.
A looming iron golem bends over, striking at something with a spiked metal fist.
But the worst ones...the ones I hate most...
A demon, wreathed in flames and bearing a sword made of the same, screams in agony and terror as wraithlike tentacles spring out of the ground and envelop it.
An illithid steps out of the shadows in a darkened alley, surprising a red-haired elf of incredible beauty. She cries out and leaps forward, dealing it a vicious blow with her rapier. But it raises one mauve hand, calling forth green and black scintillating energies. The elf gasps in terror and tries to jump away...but too slow. Too slow. Long fingered, slimy digits grasp her shoulder firmly. The sickly lights spread over her body...and she screams...and vanishes.
Five people stand in a room with a slack-jawed elf. The elf is chanting in a voice like thunder, and the room's walls are covered in faintly glowing arcane sigils. Tiny, insectile things are scurrying from out of the elf's mouth around his face as he incants. The spell grows...reaches its climax...and the walls fade to transparency, revealing innumerable writhing, squirming jet black worms...as though the room was merely a cubicle floating in a sea of leeches.
An illithid lies lifelessly on the ground. On the back of its head are two straight scars making an X. A foot cautiously reaches out and pushes it over...there's a gasp of horror. Its hands are tied with purplish tentacles. Its face has only four bleeding stubs around its maw.
The last one fades away.
...are the ones that show me what might still be coming.
The view zooms back, exposing a dark orb in a dark sky. There is a corona off to one side, as though the sun were in a state of eclipse. The surface of the orb is slightly glossy...as if covered with ice. As it turns, we see that this globe is in fact the world itself. The northern continent has a lake that looks horribly like an eye...and from farther south, things begin rising out of the frozen obsidian seas. Great towers, or something like it. Each one must be miles across, and swiftly growing upwards, away from the surface. We continue to pull back, and abruptly the awful truth can be seen.
The 'towers' are in fact tentacles...four of them. They begin to undulate loathsomely in space around a crater that opens in the center of them, deepening into a mouthlike cavern. The 'eye' glazes over, becoming the featureless white of an illithid's.
There's a gasp of horror, and the scene shifts abruptly to a woman sitting up straight in bed, though we cannot see her features clearly. The view pans in closer, coming around towards the table. The woman reaches for a lamp at her bedside with a shaking hand. The view comes in close on the lamp.
In this way, I suppose, being awake is no different than being asleep.
The lamp lights. We catch a glimpse of long, slightly curved claws on the fingertips as they're pulled away. The view starts pulling back.
It's that image that drives me. No matter what might get in my way. It gives me the imperative that keeps me going, though all hope seems lost.
Finally we see her face. It is clearly the same woman as from the very first image; the image of the illithid slave woman. She is no longer raddled by hunger and mistreatment, but her face is eerily changed. It seems to be made of flexible, glittering gold, and there are curious ridges above her eyes, circling around her temples. Her eyes are still silver, but are nothing like human now. They are chrome orbs, marred by vertical oval slashes, like a cat's pupils. Her lips peel back from her mouth in a snarl, and it's like looking at a shark's grin.
I will not let that dream come to pass.
The light goes out...though the unsettling image of those reptilian eyes lingers in the darkness for a moment longer.
---
The Chronicler has returned.
The story continues.
Doom awaits.
Vitis Chronicles: The Rise of the Illithid
Previously in Vitis
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