Stench of Death
The Never Ending Quest - Episode 84326
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Lord Fred makes the decision to press on and get to the bottom of this.
Despite the thick foliage and smoke, he can still make out glints of the
flame in the distance. As he heads toward the flame, deeper into the
forest, he can feel the smell of rotting flesh grow stronger with each
step he takes. After just a few minutes, it feels as though the stench
is a viscous, living fluid which is slowly creeping into his sinuses,
eyes, and throat, until it becomes unbearable. He stops for a moment to
find a piece of scrap cloth in his rucksack, soaks it with water, and
ties it around his face to attempt to stave off the stench and the
smoke. This works for him, but only marginally. After replacing his
helmet onto his head overtop the makeshift mask, he continues walking.
He can hear the fire burning now, crackling and spitting hot embers into
the air. As he continues to move forward, he can still hear the strange
noises in the forest.
Suddenly, he hears a hissing sound moving towards him at some ungodly speed. By the time he's had time to barely comprehend it, he's been knocked to the ground by something he's unable to see. Overtaken by shock, with this... Thing... Pounding on his armour, trying to gnaw through its plating, Fred collects his thoughts and throws the creature aside. Through the darkness, he can't distinguish what it is, but he can, just barely, make out its location and the fact that it is of humanoid shape. Fred draws his sword, keeping his eye trained upon the assailing creature. It charges at him again, letting loose a loud screeching sound, leaping at Fred. Our hero lets out a mighty swing as the creature comes into the range of his sword, cutting the beast in half. He takes a step forward to attempt to inspect it, but only finds that its torso has taken hold of his boot and is attempting to gnaw through the chain-mail covering his ankle. With another swing of his sword, he cleaves the creature's head into two halves, one of which flies off into a nearby thornbush. At that, the creature's assault finally ends. Fred hears more hissing and rustling of leaves around him, seemingly converging upon his position, and quickly makes the decision to double-time it towards the flame, out of the forest. As he weaves between trees, he can hear the footsteps of more creatures following him. Hissing, spitting, screeching, grunting, louder, louder, louder. By the sound of it, there are at least eight of the beasts chasing after him. He makes it out of the forest, coming into an open field. He's faced with a large stone wall approximately fifty feet in front of him, but the fire's light reflects off of the smoke cloud above to clearly illuminate the field. In this opening, he can see his adversaries by the firelight to face them in combat. What he sees, however, only frightens him more. They appear as animated corpses, swiftly closing in on him. He counts at least twenty of the beasts, and readies his sword. "DIE, FOUL CREATURES OF HELL!" he screams, as he lunges towards the horde of walking dead, making a wide, powerful sweep through them with his heavy steel sword. He continues to make a violent series slashes into the mob with his sword, but it almost seems as if the more he kills, the more of the beasts come out of the woods. Not to mention, many of the creatures he'd thought he'd slain come crawling toward him, some even still running. Just then, he hears something. "Hey buddy! Come up here! Be quick about it!" shouts a voice from between the parapets at the top of the wall. Fred notices a rope ladder has been let down the side of the wall, and proceeds to run toward it. "There you go, come up here, get away from those things, they don't care what kind of armour you're wearing, they'll still rip you limb from limb. What's your name, friend?" asks the stranger atop the wall, as he helps Fred over the parapet to the walkway atop the wall."I am Lord Fred," he says, between heavy breaths, "and I thank you for saving me. Who might you be, kind sir? And what are those... Those... Things? And where am I? And what's the fire all about? And wh--" "Hey, one thing at a time, I only have one mouth! My name is Henry, and I tend the fire here. Come into my shack, and we'll eat something and I'll answer any questions you may have."
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Stan Phylipth
11/23/2008 6:08:37 AM
Extending Enabled
24968061 episodes viewed since 9/30/2002 1:22:06 PM.