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Torn God: Watcher of Deep Places (Web Novel) - Book 5: Chapter 21 Of Mice & Men [Part 1]
Book 5: Chapter 21 Of Mice & Men [Part 1]
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She hated the sun by day, too bright by far. She hated herself even more for the envy she felt toward what she had come to love. Everything came too easily to him, including her own regard, and that knowledge cut like a knife. Had it been a one-sided fancy, she could have let it go, a passing indulgence for idle moments. But he loved her nearly as much as she loved him.Yet he loved her for all the wrong reasons. Not for her family or her wealth, nor even for the sharp blade of her mind, as she wished someone would. No, he claimed it was her smile that made her the most beautiful thing in the world. And she hated him for it, and hated herself for feeling that way.
- From the journals of Genelle de Lancon circa 366 AC.
I bent low over the cringing creature, that gaunt, ratlike monstrosity trembling at my feet. Casting Sage’s Sight, I watched the information coalesce into view, each line of text burning itself onto the back of my eyelids.
Janazan - Entropic Giant Rat [Evolved] (High Priest lvl.17)
Health: 246/246
Stamina: 32/37
Mana: 3/13
Mana: 6/13
Proselytize (lvl.5)
Plague Bolt (lvl.3)
I frowned. Two separate Mana pools. Two heads, two Mana reserves—some ghastly mutation, perhaps. Its fur was patchy, streaked with oily filth that wafted a choking stench into the already blood-soaked air.
“Janazan?” I ventured, letting the syllables roll off my tongue. At once, both heads quivered as if in a rapture.
“Just as-as it was said, He knowss! He knowss!”
The creature’s raspy, double voice grated, echoing against the walls. And then, like a swarm of living shadows, the other Entropic Giant Rats squeaked and hissed in unison, their shrill chant crescendoing into an almost deafening roar: “He knowss! He knowss!”
It chilled me. Could these rodents truly be the same foul brood Larynda and I had inadvertently spawned in the Sewers? My blood went cold at the notion. Had we created a monstrous rat race in our wake?
“As you say, we are Janazan,” squealed one of the heads, voice hitching in nervous excitement. “We-we are Jan and Zan. Janazan we are. Blessed are we for finding you. Glories will come—they will come!”
A frenzy spread through the mass of matted fur and gnashing teeth as a chorus of squeals, chittering, and vile praise thundered in the ruined hall. The words “Glories will come!” rang out over and over, and a creeping annoyance replaced my initial fascination.
Just as I opened my mouth to silence them, Janazan raised its heads. Sightless eyes turned in my direction. A wet, squelching sound emanated as the creature moved closer, and a rancid odor assaulted me.
“Your will-will… Father. What do you wish of uz?” he hissed, each syllable punctuated by a twitch of his sagging whiskers.
I paused, assessing my options. A vast legion of rats would be… problematic, to say the least. Yet it could also be a weapon, if directed properly. But how to keep them out of sight? They were too weak for direct conflict—Janazan’s level alone betrayed that. Still, I could send them away… let them grow and gather strength beneath the world’s notice.
The decision crystallized in my mind. Words spilled from my lips before I realized I was speaking, as though another presence within me guided each syllable.
“Beneath,” I pronounced, voice grave and echoing. “Search the dark and shadows beneath.”
A shock of calm energy rolled through me. It felt right, like a river surging around a boulder. I pressed on, letting the command ring with authority.
These words… they were not entirely mine.
“Go below, my children. The surface world is not yet for you. Descend into the Mother’s Dark and multiply. Kill in my name those who dwell in the Great Below. Slaughter them. Feast and grow strong.”
A collective sigh of delight rippled through the horde. Filthy paws pounded on the blood-spattered floor.
“Yess! Yess!” they shrieked, voices crackling with fervor.
“Be silent,” I snapped, letting that hollow resonance tighten around the words. “Go now and heed my will.”
The chamber dropped into an eerie quiet. Even the scuttling of rat claws seemed hushed, as though they dared not scrape the stone too loudly. Janazan—both heads bobbed forward. I grimaced as its fetid body sidled up to me.
“It has taken us many years to find yous, Father,” he said, proffering five ghost-white seeds in a mangy paw. “Take these seeds of Kakapuna. Summon us when the time is right.”
They looked more like embryos than plant seeds. In response, I cast Identify:
Kakapuna Seed
Health: 5/5
“You will-will know,” the other mouth chimed in, its tone somehow more sinister. “Throw the seeds of our Covenant upon the ground, and we will come. We are the people who remembers.”
“Good,” I replied, taking the seeds and pulling away from the reek of his matted fur. “Now go… be more, be the many.”
At my command, the swarm dropped onto all fours as one, flowing out of the hall in a writhing tide of unholy fur. Their scattering footfalls sounded like sewage sluicing away, leaving behind only the wide-eyed, horrified survivors. Those pathetic humans, so close to becoming the rats’ next meal, barely believed what they had just witnessed.
I stood rooted to the spot. The odd trance-like fervor that had seized me began to fade, leaving behind a blurred sense of… inevitability. The voices whispered that it was unimportant. Yes, unimportant. And I agreed.
Gilgamesh needed to wait.
All things considered, matters had turned out for the best. After all, who would listen to the ravings of a soon-to-be slave or indentured servant over the heroic conqueror who had just seized this city for the Sultana?
The truth, my truth, remained hidden. And the rats, the rats would grow like festering cancer deep within the bowels of the earth.
