Sight gags were a lot less funny when you were living them. While not as horrifying as some of the things I had lived through, there was still the need to buckle down and go with the flow. Fighting against corruption often had you burst from the pressure, so I had learned to play along when possible. Let the line go slack to tire the fish out, lest the line—and my sanity—broke for good.
“Wait.” The pigman raised his arms to wave away the impending death. “Are you… Eric Redd?”
My eyes narrowed, and I lowered the revolver. “Sure am, partner.” Gag.
Some manner of dirty, clogged gears began to shift behind the dead eyes of the demon. “Oh.” He rubbed his snout and turned to point at the big building up ahead. “King will see you.”
Huh. Over the rest of the detritus amongst every corner and groove of the surrounding area, the smell of a trap rose up. “How is it that you know me, f-friend?” Wow, even my psyche struggled to get that word out.
“Devil woman told King about you, said big Hunter… and uh - we no eat.” He scrunched his cartoony pig face up at the lack of a potential snack I had just become.
[Seems Seth’a upheld her side of the bargain.]
More importantly, it seemed as though I didn’t murder her in the saloon… incident. Although, I wasn’t too sure how effective her warning to the King had been if he was willing to parlay with me. Usually, that sort of thing ended up with a wide hole through them - one they couldn’t talk through.
“Thanks, little piggy. Any way I can prevent this conversation from happening with all your chums?” Having to state my name to every demon that I wandered by in the town would get old pretty quickly, and my revolver was much better suited for long dialogue.
“Uhhhh.” A stubby finger became lost in his nostril. Perhaps we would have stayed in this state for eternity, as no further brain cell sparked to life within his thick skull.
[Let’s just play it by ear, Eric.]
“Swell idea, Wight.” I allowed him to spin the revolver twice before I holstered it. Cliche but one of the small delights I could grasp in my current state. Normally, pigmen wouldn’t move my needle, corruption-wise. Coming down from the Titan maw and the head injury left me vulnerable, and covering myself with pigmen gore might lubricate my descent into true horror. “Take care, bud!” I waved at the pigman as we passed. True horror.
The state of the town didn’t improve as we walked further in. If one perhaps anticipated that the dregs of their society would live on the edges, you would be wrong - as pigmen society was all dregs. Everything was coated with a thin film of snot, bile, shit, and other bodily fluids that I didn’t want to consider. The buildings were no less ruined and hastily constructed - the only thing that increased was the pairs of eyes glaring us down.
Apparently, arriving at the open town center without being accosted prior was enough of a pass to prevent every pigman from questioning our presence. Certainly, if a human Hunter and a large bird had managed to slowly walk down through the area, then either they were bad eating or bad news.
I liked to think we were both.
“So what are we asking the King, again?” It might do me well to get some grip on the situation. It wouldn’t do for me to show up to royalty with nothing but an itchy trigger finger.
[As always, the Organization seeks information.]
My head nodded, but I was already tired of the reveal. Any information the Org truly wanted out of the pigmen was ‘how close to death can Eric get today’. And if history was any indication, pretty fucking close. Of course, they didn’t know about the Sea - or the Saloon - or at least I hoped. A question for Wight in quieter times.
[Failing that, you know the drill.]
Kill all demons. The drill screamed out as the screw was already punctured through the wood as much as it could go. Demons in the Lowers were not worth trying to bargain or reason with. Even devils, you could only trust them if you held power over them, and they’d try to get out of that situation as quickly as they could. I penciled in putting a bullet into Seth’a if this little Quest went pear-shaped. Or fifteen-foot red beam-shaped.
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“I’ll do my best.” To do what? To get my promotion, at least. I’d need to be Level Ten to be allowed to play in the Mids, as much as that both excited and terrified me. There was only so much playing in the shit you could do before your hands stunk of it. Middle Hell was the big league when it came to the scope of the Org. It meant demons like Joxx’un and Cherub - and I’d want to be a lot more powerful to attempt to fight them. Or parlay.
We started to ascend the stairs, hewn roughly from chunks of the surrounding Hell. It was a surprise that the square remained pretty empty and devoid of violence. The smell of a trap had become a ringing in my ears. A constant warning buzz.
“Feel that, Wight?”
[Yes. This is unusual.]
That would be putting it lightly. So what was the real test here? Was it avoiding the trap set? Was it stepping into it on purpose and dealing with the consequences? Perhaps I was literally meant to speak to this pigman without blowing either of our brains out. I couldn’t kill all demons in the Mids. As we reached the door to the… mansion, I exhaled deeply from my nose.
“Whatever happens, it’ll be neato if it gets rid of my predicament.” I knocked on the door - with my hand rather than unrelenting firepower.
[Agreed.]
“Who there?” A guttural voice vibrated through the door.
“Eric Redd.” I smiled at the closed door. “Oh, and Wight.” I shot my patron a thumbs up - it made sense to introduce him now that he was a walking thing.
[Unnecessary, but thank you.]
I had just noticed that whenever he spoke, his beak would open - but only once for the whole sentence. Like the words were just falling from the opening until he sealed them shut once more. That was going to be very distracting, and in fact-
“Okay, King will see you, Redman.” The shuffled noise of a bolt breaking off of the door and clattering to the floor, followed by muffled cursing, came before the door was opened.
It always amused me when demons called me Eric the Red, or... anything other than derogatory words.
Despite the outside of the building giving the impression of a large building that possibly had different floors and set rooms, I was yet again let down by my own positive imagination. Immediately inside, the whole thing was hollow - to our left, a large stage with a throne atop it was pretty much the only furnishing. The throne was currently occupied by the apparent King, and a wide grin spread across his face on seeing our entrance.
Pigmen warlords were often larger than most of their brethren. Not only were they meant to be either smarter or stronger but also the most greedy. The King was this on a much more extreme scale. His bloated gut hung down to the floor, obscuring his legs. Covered in boils and pustules, his surprisingly short and stubby arms scratched at his greasy chest - and an impromptu table for all the food shuffled in front of his wide, slobbering maw by two unfortunate minions.
“Eric,” he bellowed out, barely able to hold his arms in the air in jubilation. The stench of rancid sweat washed down the room over us. Despite my cartoon-o-vision softening up the edges of his appearance, it did nothing to save the sanctity of my nostrils.
“Great King.” I gave a quick bow, not wanting my face to be much closer to the ground than it needed to be. The wooden flooring was at least soaked with piss, and I didn’t want to come down with any diseases today.
The giant pigman chuckled, sending necks and loose sacks of fat jiggling. “I have heard of you.”
I slowly nodded. Even with my predicament giving the language the benefit of the doubt, talking to the King already felt like pulling teeth. What manner of information could the Org really want?
For being a throne room, it was surprisingly under-guarded. Between the doorman, two minions, and a couple pigmen down the back end of the building, that seemed woefully out of place. Something was off. After my silence settled in the room, the King continued.
“What do I have pleasure? Of Eric Redd being here?”
[The information is in relation to the portals.]
Oh, now that made a little more sense. It was almost a relief that the Org was still chasing those down - things had been quiet, and I was worried we would miss our window. Thankfully, demons seemed to work on a different urgency than humans, and doing something clever like activating them all at once was beyond their capacity.
“We come for information about the portals, Great King. We understand you know of the Middle Hell's plans.” I rolled my tongue around in my mouth. Counted my teeth as the King replied.
“I do. But what does King get in return?”
“You get to live to see tomorrow.” The words had left my mouth before I had checked them, a surprisingly direct threat for how otherwise pleasant I had been. Everything had a limit, I supposed.
“You come here, offer threat?”
“Gee, sounded more like a promise to me.” Against the will of my nose, I walked forward across the soft wood, approaching the King.
[Careful, Eric.]
“I have heard that you are strong. But no threat to King.”
He was wrong, and I had all my teeth. Funny how the world can make so much sense in such an odd time. A wave of calm passed over me - strange as I’d almost expected a spike of adrenaline as the deliberations got more heated.
“Well.” I worked my jaw.“Let’s hope we never have to find out?” I could try my best, but he was antagonizing me - the Org could see it clear as day. Plus, that portal information was something we could really use.
“King is going to travel through portal into stupid mortal world and eat every living thing in King’s reach.” To accentuate his point, he ran his large, sloppy tongue across his teeth.
“I can’t let that happen - I’m awfully sorry.” My hand gripped at the revolver handle, but as I drew it, the floor gave way beneath my feet. Didn't even give me the necessary cliche groan.
Vertigo as I fell into darkness, and then a thump of mushy water. I clambered to my feet, trying to get my bearings in the knee-deep mulch. It smelled horrible and felt cold and sticky against my skin.
I turned as multiple pairs of eyes in deep crimson lit up like stars in the pitch abyss surrounding me.