The city grew first, the population second.
In the hallway: gentle candlelight filters through pale stained glass. This warm orange glow is too diluted– it leaves flickering shadows where it cannot reach.
In one of these shadows, a being is coalescing. This shape is wretched and splays across the ground. Humanoid fingers twitch quietly on all four limbs. A chest, more ribs than skin, rises and falls to an unseen rhythm. The head is notably missing.
The Ghoul—for that is certainly what it must be, given its pale yellow texture and raw flaking fingers— is being born from thin air. Skin multiplies and stretches over gaunt bones. A spine creeps up its back and sprouts an entire skull like a fruit off the vine. When it first grows the vocal cords, they vibrate with an unformed scream. Then, as if testing the new organ, the Ghoul tentatively vibrates them at different pitches. The sound resembles humming.
The Ghoul aimlessly hums a melody. It is improvised and surely awful, but at that moment, it feels entertained.
It keeps up this guttural display of life. The sound becomes strained with pain as a face stretches over its skull, with a mouth and complete throat to match. Then the tune becomes lively. Triumphant, even. The Ghoul's shaking fingers curl and uncurl. It hums to itself with a contented smile on its face.
Its newborn voice suddenly gives out into a raspy cough. It frowns.
Testing the rest of the body, the Ghoul finds itself to be functional but similarly weak. The four arms flop back and forth as it discovers its range of motion. Eventually, its frail hands move against the ground behind it. With a push and grunt, it sits upright.
It opens its mouth and breathes in and out a few times, curious eyes staring at its still-prominent ribcage moving up and down.
The candlelight flares behind the pale windows, so the Ghoul turns to watch the fire. Its instincts scream that light is good, and safe, and to go towards it. So then, shifting onto all fours, it crawls up to the clear glass. It thunks its head against the barrier, eyes still trained on the flame.
Thunk. Thunk. Crack. The glass begins to split.
In the next motion, the ghoul smashes through, then reels as if struck when the noise resounds. It skitters back on four hands. Its stance is alert and it bristles as the shards crash upon the ground.
There it pauses, spooked. Then another unfamiliar noise rings out. The sound of steps on stone tiles. Slowly, from the dark, a bulbous humanoid around 8 feet tall moves on weighted steps towards the broken glass. Its body is pasty white even in the red light from the revealed candle. Upon its legs are leathery trousers. Upon its back a bundled blade.
It pauses when it sees the Ghoul, alert and terrified, crouching by the mess.
Then it laughs. In a deep, rumbling voice, the Shambler speaks. "Ghoul child. This world is cruel to the lonesome, and my methods are painless. You… won't understand or appreciate this favor, but I will enact it regardless. Come." The Shambler's lip curls back into a toothy smile. Its hand reaches for the weapon.
The Ghoul's instincts scream to attack and kill. But the same instincts also screamed to reach the fire... So for a moment, it pauses, attempting to find a different path.
The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
It recalls the grumbling voice the Shambler spoke in. It remembers humming. It looks at the warped mouth, the grinning teeth. It remembers doing the same with its face, and feeling at peace.
So the Ghoul smiles wide. Then it begins to hum tunelessly.
The Shambler pauses, its smile faltering. This hurts the poor Ghoul's confidence, but it's already chosen. It will follow this path until a result appears. So the banal hum continues. The two of them are frozen. The Shambler in confusion and incomprehension, the Ghoul in focus and intent. It must not give up. It must keep going.
But it can't last long with its new lungs. The moment shatters when the Ghoul breaks into a cough.
It flops back on the ground, energy spent, and immediately begins to snore.
[—-------—]
Bief returns to Casket with a Ghoul cradled in his arms. The gatekeeper gives him a dismayed look, but he rumbles out "Snack for later." and trudges home, ignoring the stares, gossip, and eyerolls. Bief hates this town. They know him too well. Think him weak because he's soft. He'll make an example of them one of these days.
Not today though. He's busy.
Bief enters the tomb assigned as his home. Several homemade blades hang off nails in the stone. An unlit forge takes up the entire northern wall. The ground is covered in wood shavings, dust, and earth.
He puts his hand out to the dirt...
A giant maggot pops from the earth and rests her head lovingly upon his hand. He rubs her until she rolls over, little legs waving towards her belly, which he rubs too.
He gets up after a long while, smile receding as he feels the weight on his arm.
"Martha, see this one for me. Any quantities?"
He gently places the Ghoul upon a bed of wood shavings. Martha obliges, curling up next to the body immediately. Soon they are both dozing off. Bief's mouth twitches. He mumbles and grumbles to himself all the way to the forge, and even after he begins to work.
[—-------—]
The Ghoul's eyes open to the harsh ring of hammer on steel, and a warmth on its belly. Its feeble head raises. A strange chubby worm is lying upon the stomach. Their bodies rise and fall with the same rhythm.
The Ghoul drops its head, eyes tracing the vaulted ceiling down the walls of weaponry. The persistent clangs continue, but it doesn't need to look at their source. It feels safe here.
The Ghoul goes back to sleep.
[—-------—]
When it's hungry, the Ghoul wakes up. It gently moves the protesting maggot away, pulls itself upright. The forge is silent and unlit.
Glyphs, white as bone on a black tar rectangle, appear before its eyes.
Newborn Quest 1/10. [ ] Eat your first meal. REWARD: CORPSE and SKIN will be QUANTIFIED. [https://file.garden/YOKV6KX47HhECOkZ/SANCTUM%20EATER/0001.png]
The Ghoul understands. Looking at this "screen", it discovers language. The knowledge coalesces like a spinal cord in a dimly lit hallway. It comes from nowhere, or rather, a place too formless that desperately seeks shape.
She now has words for herself beyond the baked-in "Ghoul", and the general "It". She understands she should choose a name, but finds it momentarily daunting.
So she turns to the oversized grub, drool leaking despite herself. But thinking first worked last time, so she tries this again.
She remembers the gentle rise and fall of synchronized breathing. She remembers peace and open, vaulted ceilings. The highest ever, probably. She still sits under them now. She thinks that even if this maggot is weak, its gift of comfort and lodging is to be cherished.
Eating it is not an option.
She turns to the maggot and rasps out small words.
"What do you eat?"
The maggot, silent, begins to patiently chew upon wood shavings. Then it crawls into her lap and falls asleep.
She takes this as a demonstration at first. But the wood has the texture of ambient dust, and tastes like tiny glass pieces. She lets it fall out of her mouth with a dismayed Bleh. Then, for a bit, she tries to scoot around to find other food with the grub still in place. It wriggles with discontent and crawls away into dirt. She almost pulls it back for a nap, but food is pressing.
She crawls to a sword on the wall. Her face reflects in its polished blade. For a moment, she admires her sunken eyes, thin mouth, and disheveled tangle of black hair.
"No good." she mumbles. "This one's too pretty to eat."
All the other swords are dismissed for a similar reason, and the forge looks frankly too daunting to fit in her stomach. There's only one place left to go, then. She turns her eyes to the only exit.