Badlands 2

If bread drives a scavenger mad, treasures drive a forager insane, and blood makes the shifter deprave. Can you guess what makes the vagabond deranged? - Chief of Kav caravan

On the outskirt of the mountain stood a concert, their faces a mixture of ferocity, misdeed, and violence. They were donned in informalities of outfits haphazardly pieced together, the likes of schmatte that had survived through the waste and decay.

One sorted himself in metal board occupied with spikes like a porcupine. Clearly, it was assorted with both offense and defense for lethality in close-combat ramming. Another had a face hidden behind a breathing mask preventing the assaults of the sand. Just as so, their weapon mimicked the same composition recycled from whatever ruin it festered, riveted together for the sake of carnage and bloodlust.

They all had different bits of earthly materials such as woods, beast bones, metals, rocks, and other strange items fashioned into their outfits and weapons to create a crude armor fitted for their surviving capabilities.

One badlander wielded a circular metal object with edges that gleamed furiously in the hulking sun. The damn thing looked like an umbrella; however, its shape, size, and look deemed it worthy of savagery and amputation.

Another corrupted his body with all sorts of boney weapons crafted from the corpse of beasts, reeking death and rot. His foul outfit in explicit intimidation of those around for they stood several feet away from the eerie bastard.

In short, their uniform was dirty, decayed, and distress and their functions accommodate brutality, maneuverability, and menace.

Approximately seven nights had engulfed the sun since the raging flames began. With such an extended time and striking blaze, it was only justified that the crowds' number would amass hovering over sixty-some, if not more.

All manner of badlanders had gathered here, ranging from the foragers, vagabonds, raiders, and shifters. Clear hostility was brewing amongst them as they observe one another, vigilant of whatever action or anomaly the other might beseech.

Four nights, it took for the flames to perish, expiring the lushes and garden in place of desolation riddled with ashen atmosphere and ruin. Tress, the badlanders once considered sporadic and reverenced in, is now reduced to charcoals no worse than the waste they are in tune with.

Initially, they had attempted boarding the mountain but had been quickly dissuaded by the aftermath of the flames. The vicinity was like a fucking volcano, waves density visibly dancing in the air like clouds, the ground acting as magma. It ate their boots quickly, working its way to the flesh. They had to patiently standby for the environment to soothe for the air was suffocating, and the heat harmful to their skin, even for a group that surfed the deadly heat of the waste.

Seven nights later and here they stood in ratty observance of the vicinity. Everyone seemed agitated and guarded.

The night had not been exactly kind to them. Some fucker had gone around killing everybody plunging the hitherto unrest further. A cruel bastard he was, torturing his victim before death, worst of all they didn’t hear any screams, all the pain pent up was a further increase in agony.

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

One had hundreds of cuts on his face, none seeming fatal save for the knife sticking out his skull.

A man-made sculpture was the other. His skin was peeled only by a layer revealing pulsing meat and veins underneath. Blood nourished the soil with small pit-patters like an organ dumped in a nylon bag. The shock and nausea that ran through the badlanders that morning when they realized the poor bastard was still alive. Paralyzed with arms raised towards the heavens like a devoted worshipper muttering incoherent words.

Nights after nights, someone was either gutted or killed for no apparent reason. This put the badlanders on edge and deteriorated the status co. It wasn’t that they feared the sick bastard, for such a scene wasn’t rear on the barren degenerate land. Only, they couldn’t suppress the discomfort of having a knife on their throat without knowing the wielder.

There's a huge disparity between a wolf in the jungle and that of the meadow, one is concealed and the later obscure. They rather not be the sheep’s pelt the fucker would wear next.

A culprit does come to mind, though, that bony riddled scum whose bones seems to grow by the day. They eyed him with rated vigilant noting his every move.

The man stepped forward, bones poking out of every organ. A crown of bones sat on his head. In both ears, he had four beast-like teeth inserted on each, one on each nostril hole. One was extending from his upper lip to the lower caging his tongue, and finally, a long pencil-like bone stitched onto the layer of his skin, sitting horizontally on his forehead. His whole self is fashioned in bones. Even his weapon reflects the same covet. One had to wonder the pain such blades would promote

Clack! Clack! His trophies disturbing the stillness causing all eyes to focus on him, and in return, every badlanders followed his steps, anxious of his goal. Their hands, on their weapon arousing an itching to cut the disgust down.

Disregarding the unrest behind him, the rotten bastard arms extended towards the barrier thereafter his muscle taut, and at a moment notice, he was in the hazardous mountain, leaving charcoal dust behind.

Momentarily caught unprepared, the badlander’s eyes followed his figure until the heatwave concealed his figure.

“Fuck! Follow him!”

“Don't let him get his hand on the treasure!

“What the fuck are yer wait in. In ya go, follow that bastard!”

They bellowed in beseech of their comrade at once, diving headfirst into the hazard. However, they were quickly forced to cease their charge. The heat in the zone remained as oppressive as an oven, immediately oppressing their lungs. Some shuffled in retreat wheezing by the borders with dread discoloring their face.

Eyes darted back to the bony disgust who remained scaling with serenity in his gait.

How audacious! The man had to be a shifter. Only those people who mutated, attaining some form of a weird anomaly in their bones through the poison of the world could produce such a result.

Shifters mutation came in the form of Super strength, hyper regeneration, or boost in agility transcending normal badlanders. Only such a person could remain poised in such a boiling vicinity. It was rear to encounter one, for they retained isolation or dominated a checkpoint or garden commanding the lesser.

Their strength was worthy of oppression.

Nonetheless, they couldn’t willingly concede whatever valuables the land owned. Badlanders had the tenacity of a roach, stubborn for all things fruitful, be it constructive or decorative. It could be a toothpick cupped in gold with no apparent usage or function.

Fuck you! I want it, and I will have it!

Miscellaneous was a currency in this land. If one takes an interest in an object, someone else, too, would surely desire it. Fuck how it looks.

Sweat visibly collected all over, drawing their befouled garb closer to their skin in discomfort. They could not continue vacillating as they had to make a choice soon before the dirty bastard bony hands corrupt all the treasure. To commit or retreat.

SPLASH! It began with a badlander resolutely downing himself in the water from his canteen. One had to keep in mind that water was rear to come by, and here was someone sacrificing it just to dowse the skin.

“Balls!” The vagabonds can only stare with bloodshot eyes as they witness water go to waste in all manner

Other’s with water followed his example, throwing their refills on them drowning the vagabonds into madness.

AH! The pain that seethe within them, they were trash at the bottom of the waste, and water was also a rear commodity to them. Their bloodshot eyes bloomed with greed and madness, but could they fight against someone assorted with all sorts of jagged machete and revolver? Certainly not.

With all badlander - except vagabonds now dripped down in liquid from head to toe, they dove headfirst into the once beautiful mountain with rooms for untold danger and riches.