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Chapter 10 - Ink and Glory

The sensation of falling was brief.

Just as quickly, a dull and noisy existence was all that encompassed the death knight. The castle had fallen - of that he was sure. He had killed the necromancer… of that, he was not quite so sure. Not many people could survive a broken neck and then a cliff fall amongst the rubble of a really terribly placed castle. But if anyone could - it would be a necromancer. Possibly he too would fall into that category.

Although he neither felt alive, nor awake. A lethargy had taken him, and darkness that left him contented and warm. Even his thoughts felt sluggish and disjointed.

Time passed.

A brief glimmer of light in the distance. Maybe this was what they meant about what happened when you died. He should follow the light, and move into it.

But he couldn’t. There was no moving, hardly a twitch within his sore, inert muscles. A trickle of truth ran down his brain - maybe he was buried underneath the collapsed castle. It would explain his lack of mobility, the darkness, and the press of a stone skull against his numb buttocks.

Gradually this light dimmed once more. Was it night now? He couldn’t really tell, nor feel, and thinking was getting more difficult. Perhaps, what he needed was a good long sleep. Yes…

When his eyes opened once more, they were dry and sore. Blearily he realised he took in new surroundings. Wait… who was he?

Wrinkled, frail arms stretched out from his thin torso, resting on a plain wooden desk. The flicker of a single candle drew his eyes around the small, doorless room he found himself in. Books lined most of the walls, dusty tomes stacked upon each other. As he watched with squinted eyes, one of them vanished in a puff of arcane smoke and aged dust.

The writer leaned forward to observe the scrawled titles of the nearest stack.

Goreblaster and Six Serpents of Sin!

Goreblaster kills the Moon!

Goreblaster the Gnollslayer!

Goreblaster…

His head reeled - every one of these books had an apparent Goreblaster title, and that name… it sickened him and filled him with fear. But why?

As he looked down at the desk in front of him, decades, maybe centuries, of memories started to click in place. An open book sat before him, and in his desiccated right hand, a quill was affixed. It twitched, as if unsure of what to do, but as his old eyes scanned the page a lurch in his stomach threatened to make him throw up.

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The title of the book was penned across the top - Goreblaster is Dead!

It was in this truth the realisation came flooding into the writer. If Goreblaster was dead then… the contract? He started to sweat despite his severe dehydration as his eyes darted around the room.

He wanted to call out - to say that it was done, pleading for it to be over now. But his mouth was dry, and nothing more than a feeble croak slithered forth. Any moment now… it should be done, he thought.

And then his hand started to move, shaking as it dipped the quill back into the ink. Panic spread across the writer’s face, unable to stop his withered appendage from acting of its own accord. Shaking in terror, he could do nothing but watch as the tip of the quill touched the page, and begin to write.

Percy stood over the excavated figure of his friend, a potion of some mysterious liquid in hand.

Goreblaster coughed and spluttered, and he sat up, the blinding sunlight almost as a terrible surprise as the fresh lungfuls of air that filled him, much like that of a foul gas in the gut of a beached whale in mid-summer.

“Honestly, can’t leave you alone for two minutes, Gore,” the voice of Percy came from above him, the short and stocky assistant/manager like a mirage to the barbarians watering eyes.

“What happened?” Goreblaster shook his head, trying to find the book… huh, what book? His mind reeled; he hated books. That fact came back to him clear as day, despite the oddness of its appearance in his mind.

“Looks like you killed a necromancer and an undead army,” his companion shrugged, now looking a little less incorporeal. “Fernando managed to find you beneath all this rubble - good thing I got the right potion for the poison you had; you were looking pretty rough.”

Goreblaster just tasted… well, like death. Despite the injuries he was sure he took during the collapse of the castle - of which he still sat in the aftermath - he wasn’t looking too worse for wear.

It was then he noticed the gathered crowd down at the bottom of the pile of rubble he was currently sitting on. Dozens upon dozens of villager-y-looking people all patiently awaiting the reveal that their hero was okay, like a gathering of dogs waiting to bite out at the treat they were desperate for until their master gives them the go-ahead.

“It didn’t take long for your victory to reach the local towns. The big skull castle was a bit of an eyesore - and cringe.” Percy smiled beneath his thick lenses, which bobbed around in the coalesced shapes that formed the short man.

“It was a bit much,” Goreblaster reluctantly agreed, still feeling like something was off. Why was he so fit and lively, so full of muscle and pep? A real hero wouldn’t be all withered away; that did make some sense, he told himself - still not entirely convinced.

“Well, aren’t you going to greet your fans, bask in their adoration and praise? That is what you wanted wasn’t it?” The tone from Percy was flat and uncomfortable as if he didn’t move to let the words out - they just existed in the mind of the barbarian, his companion only a brief vehicle for their delivery.

The barbarian did want that. On unstable legs, he stood. Drawing his magical sword, he held Pureheart aloft in acceptance of his victory. It all felt so right, so natural, but at the same time so… scripted.

“We have a mission close by here actually,” Percy continued behind him. “Some half-lizard half-elk monsters have been growing to unnatural size and terrorizing the local populace."

So soon? Goreblaster thought. “But why?”

“This is how it has always worked, Gore. We start with a win, we end with a win, and then there’s always new trouble. It’s in the contact.”

Goreblaster continued waving to the crowd, a single tear running down his confused face.

It was in the contract.