[Chasm], [Chasm], [Chasm]—it’d grown tremendous, a black sun emitting both frost and flame. It’d come from the HELL word occasionally found near the core of that collected energy, which released the iciness and heatwaves. Both crystalline air and humid droplets were sprayed from the charging attack.
“That’s my move!” Swishy complained from atop the Straw Guardian.
And it’s our darkness. Taste and see, straw puppet.
“I’m no puppet either!”
You are. Yet you defy the natural order. Ruby’s order. Your life is much more difficult than it needs to be. Insisting that your life is yours…what foolishness. Property has no will or ambitions. Property serves and, if their master wills it, is cared for.
And they believed every vile word they said. Their dark auras pumped one non-vile word through him: CONVICTION. While the conviction flowed through their bodies, their spirits pushed out a miasma of malice and despair toward the [Chasm]. Evil existed in this world, and the wrathravens wanted their prey to know that it was them. Darkness obscured but never hid, forever brazen and confident.
Swishy nervously twisted the rake in his hands, eyeing the growing darkness.
But he couldn’t fall prey to distraction. Because the wrathravens were a flock, one strong in their solidarity and teamwork—their shared commitment to malice—he needed to multitask. The beasts were causing an array of planned-for and worrisome problems.
The wrathravens had begun their three-pronged attack against Swishy and company:
The attack on the stake.
The attack on Trey.
And the growing, growing [Chasm], which guarded the domain exit.
And each of these problems were ones that the Straw Guardian physically couldn’t reach.
The wrathravens were agile and careful, choosing a long-distance assault, each of their mouths filled with cursed flames.
“I knoweth what you’re thinking, Lord Swishy. The flock offended your sense of justice does it not? I understand. But this is strategy. There is no such thing as a fair fight. Not even a god can undo such an immutable rule. One is stronger. One has more numbers. One is supported in an innumerable amount to undo their enemy. My attraction to your gold is one of that unevenness, of your divinity. Justice is might.”
“I understand. I get but it’s not might. Might just wins. Real justice is gold.” The branches Straw Guardian illuminated to illustrate the point.
Bristles lost himself in the light show. His innocent side had come out briefly he came out of his stupor and absent-mindedly flexed his Nevermore.
And then he brought the fight to the wrathravens—Bristles could fly, after all, and forced as many as he could into close-quarters combat. He went straight for the [Stake] attackers, knowing that it was Swishy’s only way up.
“Thank you!” Swishy called.
“Your gratitude sustains me, dear liege. I will not fail. Murder is my forte as you well know.”
“I know.”
We DEFINITELY know, murmured birds throughout their Straw Guardian hiding spots.
Yet the wrathravens were methodical in their aggression. Rather than get hole-punched to death, they sped off and fired [Black Blasts]. The psychopath hunted them down, dodging or blocking attacks with his wings as needed. As Bristles proceeded to fly around the perimeter of the guardian’s head, picking fights, the wrathravens were careful to encircle him at any given moment, always a three vs one.
Unfair fights were their specialty.
Meanwhile, the rest hung back, choosing to keep flying above the Straw Guardian, blocking its escape plans through intermittent blasts and feeding of the [Chasm].
All around, the wrathravens feasted upon them with their smiling eyes and blast-charging mouths.
The Znitches, taking the lead from Zone-Zeuce-Zhird, were silent and concerned.
Znitchy had choice words for the wrathravens, namely: Fuck you bitches.
Then the little bird seasoned it with: Your mom’s a ho.
Ho, Swishy would have to ask Trey about that one. What a ho was, where one would find a ho at. Swishy was gold-straw giddy over the fact that the Znitches had learned some of Trey’s colorful language. Speaking with the soul was a beautiful thing. And though he wished Znitchy would come into hiding, that little bird had already died before, so what was one more death even if it’d mean a final one?
The wrathravens glared at the bird, their gaze almost like a red beam.
Znitchy flew away then, retreating into the Straw Guardian—with a final word, of course: “You’re still bitches, though. Show them Swishy!”
“Me? I know I’m supposed to but don’t make them mad first!”
Znitchy was gone, though, huffing off in an unseen corner of the colossus.
Swishy, while briefly annoyed, respected the source of the runt bird’s confidence, and couldn’t wait for Trey’s [Doze] to heal his favorite person and battle partner.
“Ho,” Swishy said experimentally.
What? The wrathravens echoed over each other, daring the scarecrow.
The scarecrow didn’t understand the sudden rage, the frenzy of which made the beasts vibrate, sending their seething vapors toward the [Chasm]. The wrathravens grew larger—and the [Chasm] did too.
But he felt good, nonetheless, because Znitchy’s vote of confidence emboldened him. There was a modest storage of gold that was produced from the event, a heartfelt and useful gift.
Still, ho business was no business for him. The consequences, the slightly harder boss fight, made the whole thing not worth it. Swishy instead settled for another pre-fight response.
“I’m going to get rid of you all. Please become nicer souls before that happens. Kindness is good, and dying a demon is…I think it’s sad.”
He raised his rake in one hand and pointed it at them, his bravado on maximum.
The wrathravens snorted, then shot [Black Blasts] into the ever-hungry [Chasm].
Even Swishy restrained his trembling their clever force-feeding of their ultimate move.
The wrathravens’ shared [Chasm] was unexpected, and the scarecrow wished that bird-kind weren’t fast learners just like he was. But it made sense. They were one flock, one mind, and one…Swishy almost thought heart but the notion of those cretins having a heart was unfathomable to him. Within their gaseous torsos, those beasts were cold and bloodless. There was nothing of worth in them to pump.
A twinge of guilt came over him as he remembered Sling’s wrathravens, those same minions that once tried to kill him but then nuzzled him before he’d gone off on this final journey.
Change was possible. Swishy, even at this moment, considered the value of being nice to and thinking generously of his enemies. His mind pivoted to the znitches on his shoulder. Change, change, change—it was possible but one never knew when it’d come. It couldn’t be hoped for. He reminded himself to not bet on evolutions that happened to convenience him.
Right now, the enemies were warmongers, and their feelings and intentions toward Swishy were charcoal black. From each wrathraven body, stacks of factory smog lifted from their skin and poured into the [Chasm]. Any negative word he’d seen in a dictionary, in a game, and in his blackwheat-producing self were present in the abyssal ball. Dark intents swirled along the chasm current like schools of fishes, like curse clusters that slugged along the sides of buildings or between the raised valleys of Straw City’s cobblestones.
Emptiness, once more, proved to be the fullest thing there was. Though a wielder of the dark, Swishy had yet to unravel the secrets of that conundrum, of potent and brick-filled emptiness.
Then they released the plethora of [Black Blasts], too many to count—and all toward the prime targets: the stake and Straw Guardian—more specifically, the Trey-containing heart chamber.
Decision time. Life demanded a defensive answer from Swishy now.
The boy’s mind turned in the fastest consideration of his life, a reflexive thought process honed by battle after battle after battle.
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Straw Guardian wasn’t infallible. He’d seen his giant felled once more, taken over by the corruption of the E-squad’s possession. It was among the worst things that’d ever happened to him and he didn’t want a repeat of that loss.
He thought of how he could protect something so massive against the horde of ranged demons. The [Trust] link wasn’t enough. There was more that Swishy aimed to do since he and the guardian were one and the same straw.
My straw, that’s it!
There was rumbling everywhere as the black blasts landed on various parts of the giant scarecrow.
And Swishy felt each blast, doubling over in…Pain? Is this pain?
Indeed, it was—and the pain was something he’d allowed on purpose. A four-letter word, a spell had activated from his inner chest, throbbing outward.
ACHE—the only way for Swishy to know how the guardian's health with pinpoint accuracy and in real time.
He couldn’t describe the sensation. There was emotional turmoil from the blasts’ DOOM, GLOOM, DEATH, DECAY—plus an intense searing of his chest. There was sorrow and sadness. There was wrath and war. Every word that infected the colossus was strictly anti-love, anti-joy—which Swishy now took a fraction of.
Swishy suffered shocks of blackwheat throughout his body in the approximate locations of the Straw Guardian’s corruption damage. He undid his parka zipper slightly and curly sprigs of blackwheat burst from the top like a bouquet of death. Trey, he thought—but calmed himself, not wanting to make the damage worse.
Dark smoke billowed from beneath Swishy’s clothes, yet he found relief again since his chest was fine—blighted, but intact and ever-protective of what he held inside.
For Swishy, it was his heart. For the Guardian, it was Trey.
Zone-Zeuce-Zhird said nothing. They remained perched on Swishy’s body, keeping brave faces amid the cursed smoke. The birds were soulscape literate, proving so through their next comments.
Suck it up, okay! It’s just the same as having nerves. You’re fine. Normal creatures aren’t SUPPOSED to get hit anyway.
“Will you help me?” Swishy groaned.
Obviously, once we figure ourselves out.
“I’ll think then, thanks.”
But be careful okay? Love that you’ve come back to Cearth, living like us mortals. But that’s not a good thing. We need a god, not another dumb animal.
“God, right. I won’t forget, I promise.”
The boy zipped his jacket up again and tried to put the rot out of his mind. But the pain was a helpful and sorrowful thing. He hated how exposed he made the guardian, a giant upon a stake, an easy, easy target.
A second round of [Black Blasts] from all over continued. Swishy wanted to panic but didn’t as he felt the [Trust] spell pulse beneath his feet. The instant activation said it all: Straw Guardian could take care of itself.
“Okay, handle it.”
The stake rumbled from the blasts and their sustained burns—but the guardian protected the chest attacks with its arms, molding the gold-straw vines into a shield, the sheer luminosity diffusing much of the blasts before they’d landed.
But black aura still touched the guardian. There was stinging in Swishy’s hands. A black aura spread over his knuckles, spreading like flame. He shook away as much as he could but a scarring of blackwheat remained.
“I’m sorry, big guy,” Swishy patted the guardian’s head.
They knew that it’d take a while to break down the body of the guardian. Attacks on the spirit were always, always effective. And though they couldn’t see the effects right away, they were patient and chose to gather more energy into their mouths.
Round 3 of [Black Blasts]. The guardian defended. Swishy’s hands corrupted further.
But this time Swishy’s lost his footing, stumbling from the sudden reverberations of the Straw Guardian’s head. Everything shook, it leaned, the stake getting eaten into no doubt. ACHE couldn’t give Swishy access to his straw anchoring. It wasn’t a creature or living soul, just magic straw, something whose health he struggled to gauge. His vision, though, was funhouse slanted.
The boy kept feeding the root, the [Stake], growing it with whatever positivity he could find. There was so much that’d gathered from below, a foundation of FREEDOM and RELIEF and HOPE from the brightened woods and emancipated spirits. The open birdcages also fed the bottom of the stake energy. There was no shortage of power to derive from the purified portions of the nest realm.
No matter what, he couldn’t let the guardian fall.
Yet positivity became a rarer commodity the higher up they went. Within the high altitudes, Swishy was one of the few energy sources that the guardian could rely on. The cleansed surface counted for less near the wrathravens, near their [Chasm].
The Znitches wondered how they could help. Their eyes never stopped scanning the area. They were the sudden prey after all. While they hoped to hide, finding different coves in the Straw Guardian to phase through, only peaking up to expose their heads to see what was going on, there was nowhere truly secure.
From above, the black hole tugged at every spirit, a roaring force that sapped the wrathravens’ collective DOMINION from the realm.
Swishy closed his eyes and pushed energy into the [Stake], soaring them toward the chasm and domain exit.
The znitches were meditating, too, figuring themselves out. An occasional static came from the tips of their wings. Zone-Zeuce-Zhird groaned about it, annoyed that so much of Trey had worked its way inside of them.
“Good,” Swishy murmured. “At least you have some magic.”
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah…Just floor it already. Their bodies sparked with impatience.
“You don’t have to tell me.”
The stake grew with greater speed.
Swishy closed his eyes in preparation to relay the message to the guardian—but [Trust] had already activated, and the guardian pushed out its vines, preparing to defend.
Within the soulscape, Swishy sensed dozens more [Black Blasts] charge up, hurtful flames raging within every mouth—though a shadowed flare caught the edges of Swishy’s vision. Movement, fast and voracious, zipping all around him. When the boy’s eyes adjusted, he knew it was Bristles, his willing but crazed savior.
“Your guardian is leaning,” Bristles said.
“I know.”
“Allow me, my might, to right these devastating wrongs…”
The wrathravens, aiming their blasts at the guardian, now turned toward Bristles.
The man, the beast, the demon, raised his flaring claw and flashed his enemies a sickled smile.
(…)
Bristles, murder enthusiast, upped his game.
The wrathravens deployed ranged tactics, and so too would he. He made the Nevermore’s arm larger, collecting the energies around him, of those he’d injured and discarded, and growing his limb.
“All thanks to Lord Swishy!” He cried, crediting the boy as he took a page from his playbook. His claw mimicked the immensity and flexibility of the Straw Guardian’s, only in a corrupted form.
The straw god’s abilities were based on guardianship and trust. Bristles just liked violence.
Every time Bristles had maimed an enemy, ripping a wing off or snatching its whole head away within the grasp of the Nevermore, a new wrathraven was available to take its place. They were organized like the snitchtalons. Formations and planning weren’t just for the weak. If darkness knew anything, it was how to deploy aggression.
While Bristles enjoyed lunging at each blast-charging bird, harming them, or forcing them to dodge and lose their charges, his progress wasn’t as easy as it’d started. Once the birds grew careful, his diminishing returns set in.
The psychopath was struggling. He’d begun to sustain noticeable damage. An array of Black Blasts forced him to shield his body with his massive wings—but as soon as his six wings came to the front of his body, the other wrathravens flanked him with their free-floating claws. Their sharp-fingered hands emerged from their gaseous torsos and shot into Bristles’ back.
SHANK, they said in a staggered cadence, repeating the word. Pockets of darkness conjured around Bristles general area—always flanking his blind spots, keeping him on his guard—before those shadows solidified into talons. Some swiped at him. Others stabbed, plunged, and twisted. He covered himself with his wings but some of the shadow shanks got through, a couple in his shoulder blade and one near his kidney.
There was no blood, only a black wrathraven smokiness that poured from his wounds.
Nevermore healed him almost immediately.
But he wouldn’t forget the injury, the indignation and the embarrassment of being stricken. He gritted his teeth and struck back with double the voracity.
[Revenge] read the massive claw that Bristles employed against his attackers. The Nevermore claw disappeared for a moment, engaging in the same obscuring vapor tricks of the wrathravens, before reconstructing—not behind them, but in their faces.
The claw swelled with pain and rage. Swishy saw the negative intents fly from his wounds and bolster the attack. DAMAGE and PAIN and RAGE pulsed from Bristles’ wounds and traveled into the arm. It all happened in an instant, as fast as a water balloon getting filled.
As Bristles gripped the face of a wrathraven charging a black blast—he forced the bird to swallow it and watched its torso burn away from the inside out.
Brutal—brutal and helpful—but Swishy wondered how long Bristles’ durability would last.
The maniacal laughter suggested that he’d go on like this forever, that Bristles was a murderous, self-healing pin cushion that reveled in hell. And he literally was that—but there was a half-life to everything. The man was going to degrade and Swishy considered the implications of helping him. But helping him is what he had to do. The scarecrow gazed at the znitches and the znitches averted their eyes from him. They didn’t want to hear it but from the pained expressions on their faces, Swishy knew that they already had the same thought.
Bristles was the lifeline—so long as his life was secured.
But for now the man decided to burn darkness at both ends, wrecking the enemy while ignoring his own body. Still, he was sensitive and highly intuitive for someone who seemed so single-mindedly obsessed with violence.
“Worry not,” Bristles declared to Swishy. “War is destruction—for others and oneself. Willingness to suffer is a type of capital too, one that defines you. Burning oneself in the moment is beautiful. I’m sure you know how that feels already, dark god that you are.”
Swishy felt his last comment like a prayer. Bristles had always been enthralled by Swishy and the idea of his divinity. But even Bristles had his biases, his preferred version of his favorite person. He loved the base version of the scarecrow, the gold-churning god that he was—but much preferred the shadowy one.
Several more [Shank] claws tore through Bristles—from the back of course.
The fluid that escaped him was the texture of blood but all black—and that toxified fluid flew back into his body.
His flesh, his darkness had sealed up. But veiny black scars were running across the wound locations. His muscular physique was majestic. In his worn state, he appeared like a weathered bust, a god of war.
Help his ass! Zone-Zeuce-Zhird called—but not to Swishy.
Hidden within the giant’s arms, a few of the znitches flew toward Bristles, carrying care packages of guardian straw in their talons.
The man-beast fought without worry, without attention to his health, but the birds glided by and tossed straw balls in his general area, which the Nevermore collected and fed into his mouth.
Bristles’ eyes livened from the gift, from his savior’s blessing. “I thanketh thee, loyal slavetalon.”
I hope you get trapped here.
“Blather doesn’t suit you. Now bringeth more straw. Hurry servant. I must save your sorry lives.”
Bird after bird delivered their payload of wheat, sparking with irritation. They made a point of popping Bristles’ skin upon each dropoff, taxing him for his blasts-and-shank healing service.
“My body will remember this insolence,” Bristles said, chewing upon the strands.
Straw Guardian proved essential to everyone’s attrition, and so Swishy continued to raise it.
They became close to the exit, to their most prominent problem.
The nebula presided over them like a faceless god, gargantuan in its strength and arrogance.
Znitchy landed upon Swishy’s head and meekly chirped. Before the domain’s mother of darkness, even the runt felt it wise to keep its little beak shut.
“Sigh,” Swishy swished.