This place was encompassed entirely by sandy shores with a single cove on the northern face; this here grotto was overgrown with vegetation at the mouth and within its throat, deeper, deeper, there curiously flowed a mystique that was yet to be discovered. The sand upon this circular coast was quite plain and insignificant- like any other. There was a squat mountain in the center of this island, nearly perfectly picturesque in comparison to most entire ranges elsewhere; higher than the peak, there was mist and all, thicker than the thickest human-witnessed fog. Over the face of this small isle that stretched in all directions for several miles, where there was not the mountain nor the sandy shores, there was a forest with patches of flat-lands all helter-skelter about the body of the seemingly faerie-infested wood. On the southern sands of the shore, there lay a full-grown man on his side, curled into a smallish ball of a form. Mr. Peculiar then began to stir. He looked about his surroundings quickly with wild, way-ward eyes and what he found did not seem to suit him at all; his icy blue irises showed a true fear. No recollection was before him and no somber trail led him in his stupor. Upon his palms, he felt sand and began clumping some in vigorous fists as he let a belt of coughs echo from him. Mr. Peculiar gasped in air for the first time, again. He smelled an ocean, and the sand, and even whispering whiffs of whiskey from his own clothes, especially around his collar. He was drenched in sweat and salt water and for a moment, he wondered why. Why? Why was he wet? Had some unfortunate shipwreck been the antagonist of his demise? Mayhap a storm- perhaps another calamity. He did not know. And after that conceptual moment passed, he didn't really care anyway. 'What the fuck?" was all that he said, wiping his dry lips. It genuinely was the phrase that summed up his oddly confused state in entirety; t'was a question, indeed, an inquiry to the universe with no verbal response. Even if he somehow did find an answer to his question, he would not have been able to interpret Destiny's parted lips to any human degree. He began to stand up but rocked on his knees then fell hard onto his ass. His shirt was a deep blue and his trousers a fading brown. Finally, Mr. Peculiar did stand fully with a frown that bordered a melancholy sadness- a sorrow- he did not understand, and one he wished to never know. But he knew it still without quite remembering.

Something about a crash, crumpled metal, and all. Had he been behind the wheel? Yes. Undoubtedly it was-

Mr. Peculiar hoisted his trousers higher onto his hips, because they were too big for his frame. He hated that. He hated most things and that's how he perceived most of the world nearly all the time, a simple succession of desolation within his very own chest; he didn't know why he felt that way, maybe he was a pure victim of circumstance and all that. Maybe he was something more. He hoped, for that's all he owned in that space of not knowing too much, not enough. His eyes, bluer than the waters out there, stared indifferently at the dancing, swirling waves that sprayed his face within the more uproarious bouts that struck unto itself. Thus, he made his way inland without paying any particular mind to where he went, but he was drawn onward, nevertheless.

-his fault. Yet there was no fault or guilt he felt, for he was the only to perish. A bottle up turned followed by squealing wheels of an automobile.

Mr. Peculiar began a stroll through the inland wood and smelled the scent of amaranths and lilies and other wondrous smells never smelled before. The light was high in the sky and luminescence flowed through the canopy in misshapen shafts of yellow gold that caught his face here or there. He shunned the light with the back of his hand. After a time, he sat with his back to what seemed a draping willow and contemplated for a spell. What an isolated purgatory this was. His orbs flickered lazily, his lids fluttering, and a strange breeze blew past him- through him. He fell to an ill and restless sleep. Once hugged in this crazed embrace of solitude, he groaned near violently.

No protection and that was probably the start of the trouble after all. Sex was dull and worse whilst wearing it. Then came the wail of a babe and within the midst of mediocrity, he found true love. This, he recalled in the corridors of interlapping dreams, woven from the threads of his life. There he was then, a quilt of mottled cloths. And he wrapped himself around this child, showing his real self for a while, with all those half-smirks and smiles.

When he opened his eyes, it was pitch black all around him. In fact, when his eyes came wide, he was not sure they were open at all. But they were, and after a while, after his vision adjusted, he saw shadows moving in the darkness. They were lumbering figures that moved and danced like daemons of a Dagon ode. They were many and not too far away either. He swallowed slowly and heard it in his ears. He hoped they didn't. He shimmied his back up the trunk of the willow as he stood. Never before had so much sweat sprung over his body. His clothes clung to him. A knot on the trunk must have been driving directly into the small of his back, because his spine tingled straight up to his neck, and though there was nothing there, it felt as if something was breathing down his collar. Within these moments of watching those creatures move, he remembered memories of a childhood where, at night, all things came to life to haunt one from the depths of ravine-like closets; it was in the places of the mind where these thoughts rested that absolute fear was locked within. Mr. Peculiar thought of bedtime stories that were too frightening and oh the lightning on storming nights. His stomach churned and his groin muscles tightened. He covered his mouth to save his heavy breathing from the things' ears, if they had any, and strained his eyes whilst craning his neck forward to get a better look at the gangly group of outlandish ghouls. Hounds of hell they surely were, fighting amongst themselves, gnashing, clawing, and the noise was sickening but low in volume, nearly inaudible. It was slime upon slime, sliding with no friction but the lubricant itself did cause a sticky slapping sound. He saw half quadrupeds with glistering skins coated in a membrane of veins and cartilage. They moved amongst themselves before him like a bustling wave with tentacle-appendages that plumed from their arched backs, swaying to and fro unmelodically as though they bustled awkwardly uncoordinated through a massive orgy. He saw no eyes. Still these monstrosities were unwary of his existence. Though these things were shining in their coat of gross lubrication, he did not spy any source of light, even from the sky. He wondered how they managed to rebound so brightly with no logical torch. But, of course, abso-fucking-lutely, the core of who he was, a breed of human purely, he was indescribably driven to be curious. So, he remembered faintly that he'd left something in his pocket. He rifled through his pocket and withdrew a small metal lighter. Mr. Peculiar gave it a strike, but nothing came forth. He glanced at the things; they still rustled vigorously in their same way. All he wanted was a better look at something so fantastically wild. He wanted to see them and their build entirely. On the second strike, he did. Regret flushed over his body in a hot-cold stimulation. Every single one of these beasts stood absolutely still and stared at Mr. Peculiar with eyeless sockets that ran like tunnels to the backs of their skulls, and there, there was no light. Yes, the glow he held in outstretched hand washed a golden color over a large spherical area, but when that gold reached these beasts' drilled ocular, orbless holes, the color ceased quite definitively, like darkness incarnate. For an eternity and a half, not the slightest sound escaped from any place. He was positive within the moments that passed that he could not breathe. Finally, he gasped and ran with no particular guide, with no intention save parting the distance between himself and the beasts. He rounded the trunk of the willow, bounding through its dangling branches, bumbling, and bustling past thickets like a man with hell on his heels. The lighter had gone out and darkness was a villain in those fitful moments. He heard them as he went. He heard them directly behind him and they were fast, ravenous. Nowhere to go, he continued onward, not daring to slow or gander over his shoulder. The wood whistled past him as he bolted further out of it; growls and howls followed him in a chorus. He began laughing and hooting with them- as though he were one. His muscles ached and he was intoxicated from his own madness. Something warm flowed over his face, something he did not understand. How long had it been since he wept aloud? He couldn't be sure; it would be awfully hard to determine, but it felt as though it must have been too long. His shoelace caught on an unseen, uprisen root and he tumbled into a wide, circular field where the grass was none too tall. Cantering, crawling to his feet, he went to the center of that naturally occurring stage where all the trees could see. There, he spun, both hands clenched at his sides. There, Mr. Peculiar made his stand. They encircled him, rotating in a line round his vicinity, closing. He began lunging at them in a faux manner, bearing his teeth against them. A few showed hesitance in their formation. His resolve stood solid. The beasts came at him, one by one, but he was unmoving and as each struck his flesh, they disappeared, dissipated straight away into a flash and mist of ash. With each creature gone, the sky grew a brighter hue of blue. With the last one vanquished and the field conquered against the innumerable Horde, he yelled at the grand, cloudless sky above, then looked down at the ground, then at the grime they'd left him coated in. Mr. Peculiar dusted himself off then sat more pondersome than previously so. He thought, and he thought hard but grasped at only frayed edges of a life before that one.

Something, something more seeped into his mind of that aforementioned past that forced him to wonder through the halls of cruel remembering. And truth came with it. There had been a fight- nothing physical of course- an argument really. He'd looked upon his wife's eyes. 'I'm not happy,' was all she had said to spur it. In the exchange of words that followed, he was enlightened with a sickness. She'd began swelling a second time by no fault of his. Mr. Peculiar responded with anger, trepidation most prominent. He'd tried taking the bundle, his child, in his arms, but she snagged it from him. He left then, vowing to return. He was pissed and drunk when he died.

After a while, he stood from the ground and saw a mount to the northern horizon. 'I'll climb it,' he said to no one; his words fell from his mouth, irresolute. Under the skin, he was undoubtedly nonplussed by what had occurred only a while before, but if anyone were to see him in those moments after the assault of the Horde, they may guess he was going for stroll. For you see, his eyes were like well-woven walls of indistinguishable will. He was more powerful than any manifestation of shadows spawned forth from him. And anyway, he wasn't fazed by the morbidity of the situation on the surface because he had faced far fiercer amounts of darkness; that was the only solution to something so absolute anyway- facing it. It's what it came to. Soon, as he went, he came on a massive, sprouting tree at the edge of the wide field that he'd yet noticed. Among it, he felt puny. Swaying in little winds, bobbing from the tips of the trees' wiry fingers there were little plump fruits that looked to glister with a dew though there was no explanation for the sparkling droplets. Here, he ate to his content. The fruits were sour and went down slowly. He plucked extra, polishing them on his shirt then depositing them in both pockets. He went on, into the forest, watching the peak of the mountain- his destination- until it was gone entirely, hidden by a canopy of Fall colors. Although he was pleased that he'd not perished against the night-fiends, no smile lay slain upon his lips, but instead they were mealy and stretched into a kind of grimace. He was terribly thirsty; his lips were dry and cracked and he could feel blood beginning to pool in the elongated ridges forming over his mouth. The fruits he'd downed were juicy but somehow didn't suffice. Mr. Peculiar wished for water- maybe something with more of a burn to it- but heard no running streams or falls. The temperature was fine in the wood he trod through, however something weighed over him, making him dab at his brow. Yes, he thought of his immediate surroundings, but he hoped more prominently than that, that his sense of direction was faring well. He ate another fruit from his pocket and tossed the core over his shoulder. In what seemed no longer than a few hours, he came to the base of the mount. In the very least, he could only assume that's where he was, because the earth was rockier and more solid. He had to take deeper breaths as he continued, and the ground seemed to slant more. The trees about were growing less dense, though the canopy stayed thick. Through sparse openings of the leaves overhead he saw bits of light shining through into the cozy colors below. And he sometimes saw what he hoped to be the peak of that foreign mountain. His hopeful queries came unveiled as the wood dispersed absolutely, as though in a mathematically fine line. And he was crawling hap-hazardly rather than walking upright. 'It's not so tall,' he told himself with a cracking smirk. But he ascended with this illusion in his head. How was he to know? It really hadn't looked so tall. But something about it made it not so. The mount was an easy prospect to any unknowing soul. Finally, he was climbing, and his knees ached in unison with the webbing under his flesh where his arms and shoulders met. His lightly calloused hands felt tender against the abrasive rock-face and his footing seemed to grow looser with each hoist- as though he were teetering at the pit of everything and he might just slip and fall forever. That's when he truly began to question the magic of the mountain. Mr. Peculiar gazed upward and saw that he was not nearly halfway up the side of the thing. He started to think of it differently, the mount. After all, it had seemed small, seeing it from down there on the ground. Then something urged him to look down. And he did. From where he was, the base was a million miles away. But he went. Very shakily, granted, but he pursued this goal, nevertheless. The idea of failing sickened him worse than that great altitude, so he felt compelled to rid himself of that ailment. He shook off cowardice like a cloak. 'C'mon, you can do this. Don't you dare give in," he whispered this like an incantation. Over and over. His fingers bled, but he did not give in. He strove, foothold after foothold. Repetition. Breath after heavy breath.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

He'd gone to the store with winos out back; the one that was filthy and smelled like shit. He recalled a smile- a mask- as he'd entered. Once he was a true patron, he galloped back to his compact car. He stared at the crumpled brown bags with glass necks sprouting and snatched a bottle up. His intention was to forget. A quarter of the swirling dark amber liquid was gone from that container before he finally drove away. By the time he had a moment to realize he didn't know where he was going, it was too late. He drew a face of wicked sadness. That's when he assumed that on some level, he'd decided to-

One last lurch brought him over the wall face of the mountain and he was only one small slope away from a serpentine trail that rested thirty yards lower than the pointed peak; this trail was cut into the mount and circled round to the opposite side. He walked the small slope then mounted the walkway. Sweat dripped from him all profuse. Mr. Peculiar followed the trail.

-kill himself.

He stopped and wiped his forehead; wasn't it supposed to be cooler at higher altitudes? He stood there, thinking of this new revelation. Had he really killed himself? It seemed so silly now. And why was it so hot up here? He possessed too many wonderments at once. His feet carried him forward, ever onward to some unknown destination. What did he hope to achieve while following this strange pull that the island had over him? For the first time up so high, he saw the island's landscape more so. It was wonderful. It was beautiful. It was expansive. But the detail he most prominently noted was that although he was risen above everything, it did not seem that the ground below was so very far away. While climbing, it was such a perilous fall, yet from where he stood then, it was little more than a slight tumble. Illusions or some other trickery of the like was all that he could assume of that life after life. He rounded the circumference of where the mountain met the cut walkway fully and saw what awaited him there. A little further onward, the trail dropped off at a ninety-degree angle, but before that, a staircase ran into the side of the trail from the right that led downward, opposite the side he'd come from. As he came upon the staircase to his right, he saw the steps were of some transparent material. The steps' edges were rounded, dulled, and worn slippery as though they'd been there a long time and many others had walked them, descending to their own Destiny. And so, there went Mr. Peculiar, descending to his. He walked warily, wearily down the case. It seemed he might slip at any moment, but the case held steady and the rubber of his shoes did not slide against it. There was a bit of a reflection to that glass-like, aqueous looking stone that made up those steps, and he saw his shadowy form in them. He noticed that his reflection looked confident, but he didn't feel like that. He felt terrible, like at any moment, something bad was going to happen to him. His breathing grew more rapid as he met the halfway point on the staircase, and he didn't have the faintest idea why. He gazed up at the sky, cloudless; he did find the time to smile queerly but stopped himself when he realized he was doing it. The sky was bright after all. Hadn't that canvas up there been blotted with a thick fog not too long ago? He thought it had but could not remember. Recollections were not his forte as of late. On the last step before his feet would strike solid, grassy ground, he stopped and peered over his shoulder from where he'd come. The case of translucent nature was changing and rising, starting from where it met the mountain and the change continued, descending toward him. As the case rose to the sky above, it turned to some mist. Soon, it was blanketing the sky and it was clouds. He stepped from it, turning his body, craning his neck backward, blue eyes averted to a blue sky changing quickly. Though this happened, no gust rambled. The last step disappeared upward. The blanket above grew dark and so did the landscape. He was in awe with his hands stuffed in his pockets, fidgeting in them nervously, searching for something and finding nothing. Perhaps he was looking for rationality in a circumstance without. It was beautiful and terrifying, like good art, because it pulled the thought of the fragility of the physical world from him and made it an actual manifestation before him. He saw nothing in that strange night phase. He had nothing to cling to in it, save his nervous sweat. There was a cold in the air that actually passed through him again. Before he could even grow comfortable with the night, a gash of light spilled open from the sky. It was a dry lightning continuously zig-zagging above. Within one of these flashes of light, he saw the image of himself and stumbled onto his bottom; in the next flash, he saw nothing where, only moments before, he'd seen his own form. There was no doubt about it, what he'd seen was himself- something had been slightly off, however. What he'd seen was his own face, but instead of eyes, there were a pair of twinkling crimson spheres sunken into a more drawn and haggard head. Those eyes- if they could be called that- had an extreme luminescence about them. It had been like standing before a mirror that distorted one's self into a daemon. Hadn't his teeth been exposed by a wide and crazed grin? His immediate recollection assumed they had been. Hadn't his teeth looked more viscous? Elongated perhaps? It didn't matter though; it must've been only another illusion, some non-existent doppelganger. It could not have been possible, his mind evidently summed up. It was an impossibility, simple as that. To cling to the last bit of sanity he owned, Mr. Peculiar refused to believe it within the realm of any reality. His mind was nearly gone, but he hung by an elusive thread that whipped to and fro, forcing him to re-find it all the time. Even though there seemed to be no physical danger amongst the dark and erratic bursts of powerful light, something, some intuition willed him to search the immediate area of ground around him with his fingertips, hoping for something to don as a projectile to launch at anything that deemed itself a presumable threat. At first, he felt nothing but thin strands of dream-like grass- but finally! There was something. It was immobile, he couldn't lift it. It was flesh covered. He turned to face it. Then came a spurt of lightning, illuminating his surroundings. And he saw that thin, drawn face again, only inches from his own. It was smiling. When the area went dark, he still saw those incandescent red eyes floating in nothing, like the lanterns strapped to Death's caleche. The eyes, they wavered but did not disappear. Mr. Peculiar jerked from his doppelganger's frosty hand, spastic, but the daemon twin gripped up his hand and squeezed with the burning ferocity of a thousand shifting tectonic plates. Mr. Peculiar tried to scream but not even a whistle of air escaped his throat. He could not look away from those eyes fit to be burning coals. And so, he was a prisoner to them, locked away within that stare; there was no word to express that tingling terror. He was finally forced to face the fire that was a part of him. But it wasn't who he was, only an isolated beast partitioned from the rest of who he was as an entity; however, within those silent moments, he forgot this and believed himself and the daemon were one and the same. And in that idea, he became lost.

He had laughed and cried and loved and longed.

But he'd also hated and punished some who had wronged him.

But he'd asked for forgiveness and been grateful to those that had forgiven him and spoken of his humility for doing so.

Had he meant it though? Probably not. It was a farce, another happy face to show people. Another mask of just contemplation. It had been in jest, no doubt.

But no! That's not possible; he did remember goodness and love and all the rest. He'd been a righteous person. He didn't steal and he gave all he had away to those with less. He'd sacrificed his own life to aid those that he believed he only brought misery to.

Lies! It had been a selfish act. He only wanted the pain and self-loathing to cease. It had been for him and no one else.

But he had been human only, a fragile minded being that had a hard time differentiating beliefs and truths. His intentions were sound!

So, he stood and fought, ripping his arm from the daemon's gripping fingers. 'No!' he screamed. A flash of lightning. He looked down at the perverted and deformed version of himself still sitting. The daemon looked so small, wiry, and fragile. It creeped to a standing posture as well and lurched towards him, bony grey fingers extending with no nails. Those red eyes were fading to some hue of pink. Mr. Peculiar's hands slipped around the thing's thin neck and he fell upon it, clenching its neck-flesh as tightly as he could muster. It was a while before he realized he was yelling some indistinguishable language as the light behind the daemon's eyes faded to black. And then he was grasping nothing in gauntlets of strangulation, and the light was back, and he couldn't remember why he was on the ground at all. So, he was standing again. He looked at the spot he'd been only moments ago, there on the ground. Nothing lay there. He laughed curiously. No weight rested on his chest and no trickles from a past life passed unto him. In this ignorance, he was bliss filled, like a man doped from a proper dosage. Then he felt the will of the island again, urging him to go only a little further north. He followed this invisible pull with no real sound thoughts or inquisitions of his position. He continued, passing through the beautiful, tranquil forest. Everything was quiet; not even buzzing insects could pierce the silence. He traveled through the wood like a man through a dream. After a spell of walking, the soles of his shoes struck the sand of the northern coast. He threw his shoes off happily, walking the coast barefoot. Then his sand covered toes ascended the steps of an ancient dock. Docked there was a single, two-man rowboat. He stepped into it cautiously as it rocked in the waves. He unharnessed the rope, and it was off with no visible push nor tug into the depths of the calm ocean. With no navigator nor oar, it rode along the coast at no distance further than forty yards, eastbound briefly, circumnavigating the shore. He enjoyed this funny, little magically propelled boat. Searching through his pockets, he plucked out a fruit and bit into it. This time, it tasted sweet, as sweet as ignorance. After a time, he very nearly dozed, but his eyes came open at the sight of the wide mouth of a dark grotto. The air seemed different there. Mr. Peculiar breathed deeply as the boat went into the cavernous cove, inhaling a breeze of Aether. That air was thicker. The grotto's ceiling lit up and the stone there reminded him of the same material that had been the make of the staircase descending from the mountain. Only, the stuff lining the ceiling glowed as though magic was more powerful there. He smiled. Even though Mr. Peculiar rode the boat into the place known as Oblivion, still, he smiled.