Dead Gardens - Chapter 1

“AGH!” My voice rang; my body hit the floor. I hissed when I felt some of my bones crack. It seemed like I have been sleeping all this time, and I was prematurely awakened once I was thrown into the ground. Perhaps I have been dropped from a high place?

“Requesting a message to Captain Dirk. This is Firmament Control Three; we have successfully dropped the targets on Wasteland Area 5347.” I heard the muffled voice of a man coming from above me; I squirmed, feeling the darkened and barren soil underneath my trembling body.

I opened my eyes, and what beheld my eyes is what seemed like an empty canvas plastered with endless strokes of gray paint. When I shook my head to focus my blurry vision, I realized that I’m gazing upon a sunless sky filled with thick clouds of smog. I then saw the origin of the voice, and it seemed like it came from a metallic ball that could fit a thin and small man like me. The metal sphere then swiftly ascended into the endless gray clouds hanging above me until I could no longer see it.

They threw me from what seemed like an empty wasteland. I could only see bare, blackened soil as far as my eyes could travel while the distant horizon is further hidden behind a thick curtain of smog.

“Where am I?” I heard the sound of a man in the distance whispering weakly. However, the smog around me was too thick for me to see where the voice came from; I can only see his silhouette. It seemed like he’s sitting weakly a few meters away from my right side.

“I heard some voices there!” Someone screamed, followed by the sound of a man’s footsteps. I then saw the silhouette of three people appearing beside the man I saw on the floor. “It’s another warrior like us! Come, help him up!” Two soldiers then raised the man slowly while another man stood there beside them.

“Is there someone else here?” Someone shouted from my left side. The three people on my right then carried the man I saw on the floor and slowly approached the man on my left side.

“Me!” I screamed weakly with a hoarse voice before groaning weakly to call out their names.

The lone man on my left side rushed towards me; the three on my right followed slower. When they finally reached my side, I realized that they were five injured soldiers, wearing a familiar white armor now dirtied with dust and blood.

“So that means there’s six of us.” The man on my left side uttered as he knelt beside me. “Don’t worry; we can survive this together as long as we work together. Who knows? Maybe we can even travel back to the Firmament and request for the empire’s forgiveness! Don’t you agree?”

The deep and commanding tone of the man kneeling beside me made me feel a bit more confident that we could genuinely survive this wretched place. This man has dark lime green hair with the familiar heavy white armor covering his body.

“My name is Gres. Those three fools are my men; we’re exiled soldiers from the Firmament… just like you. You must be a wizard since you’re wearing a black robe; you must have done something fucked up if you’re here with us.” The man looked at me with a gentle smile, which I only reciprocated by looking at him with a nod. “Not a talker, huh? That’s fine. We can still work well, knowing that we have a wizard on our ranks. Let’s go. The monsters will find us if we don’t move.” Gres said with the same warm smile as he extended his arms toward me.

I was confident about this man. I’m not sure about his friends, but I can work with this group. This is the start of my army, my men, my empire. And with whatever remained of the Wasteland, I will destroy the Firmament.

At least, that’s the plan before it all shambled into pieces.

“ARGH!”

The voice of a man’s pained screech took our attention in a snap. I moved my head to see what’s happening and saw something long, wet, and sticky wrapped around the weakened body of a soldier on my right side. The two soldiers carrying another injured man took a step back, making them drop the person they’re holding onto the hard, cracked, and dusty ground. Meanwhile, the wet, rope-like thing continued to constrict the soldier in white armor so hard that I could see his armor bent as he screamed in agony. A sticky fluid coming out of the rope-like creature wrapped around the soldier’s torso then dripped down to his feet, slowly melting his armor.

Seeing the suddenness of such a horrible attack on his fellow warrior, Gres decided to raise me up by placing my arms around his shoulder while his hands gripped my torso gently. The origin of the rope-like creature is hidden somewhere in a darker area hidden beneath the smog. Now that I have the time to look at it, I saw that the thing constricted around the soldier’s torso looked something like… a brown tongue. The tongue-like rope then lifted the soldier into the air; the agonizing face of the white-armored warrior turned pale while his wailings softly silenced. Another warrior on the side rushed towards the tongue-like rope and used his spear to slash it. However, when his blade touched the tongue, it instantly melted; his strike is nothing but a futile attempt.

Then, the soldier that had been lifted into the air suddenly turned ghastly pale. The lower half of the white-armored soldier’s body fell onto the floor in less than a minute, revealing his mangled innards, blood being mixed with melted iron. The tongue moved all over the upper body of the now dead and mutilated soldier until it reached his head. The thick, tongue-like rope then entered the soldier’s open mouth and pierced right through him until we could see it peeking out of the soldier’s stomach. Blood, intestines, bones, all of such grotesque things dripped out of the lifted upper body of the poor soldier, falling swiftly to his now bloodied lower-body on the blackened ground.

The tongue-like rope pulled back into the hidden area around the smoke, taking the soldier’s upper-body with it. When it did so, we heard the loud sound of bones crushing, metals clanking, and liquids slurping like someone’s eating spaghetti. This was then followed by a large gulp before hearing a blood-curdling screech in that same area.

A black snail with no shell slithered towards the bloodied lower half of the dead soldier on the floor. From a closer observation, we could see that it looked more like a human being with blob-like skin and no limbs, moving forward swiftly by using its awfully human-like head. The slime-like humanoid opened its mouth so wide that it instantly devoured the man’s lower-body with only one bite.

“RUN!” Gres said as he carried me on his back.

While Gres ran, one soldier beside us falls after hitting his head on what seemed like a gigantic ball. Once the man raised his body to stand up again, countless buzzing sounds left the hardened orange ball that he had just accidentally hit with his face. Numerous gigantic mosquito-like insects then flocked all over the soldier, making him give out a gurgling scream, which only lasted for a few seconds. After a while, when the soldier turned silent, I looked back and saw nothing else there but more insects moving towards the two soldiers who were left dumbfounded after seeing their spears melt quickly when they struck the tongue-like rope. The snail-like humanoid then bit one of the soldier’s waist, making him fold easily like paper. After a while, the snail-like creature gulped the crushed man quickly without the need for chewing.

Meanwhile, the weakened and injured soldier on the ground crawled back with a shriek as the enormous mosquito-like insects flocked around him, and in just a few seconds, he disappeared entirely as well. Not even his armor was spared. The mosquitoes moved towards our direction, which alerted my primal instinct. I instinctively cast a spell to blow them away using a weak wind spell I learned when I was young. That was the best I could do at that time since I had little to no energy left in my body. Although that spell was enough to sweep the insects to their deaths, it also blew the smog away from us, revealing the deep secrets hidden within it. I saw a plant with black petals with a round, thorny mouth in its center. A long tongue was coming out of it as it moistened itself with what looked like its own saliva.

I then moved my eyes away from it and saw another humanoid creature. The creatures in question had long black hair, human-like pale skin, and a body that looked like that of a human being. However, with broad leathery wings where their arms should be and tall legs that looked like extended chicken feet, I could confidently infer that they are not at all humans. I noticed their large and perfectly circular eyes and how they can rotate their head about their neck to look at what lies behind them. Thus, it managed to detect me with the greatest of ease. It’s also notable to know that this creature had a long, furless tail spanning from their crotch area and arcs up to their back, ending with what looked like a red triangular-shaped tip. I could faintly see some claws at the end of their wings that they probably use to fend for themselves. It astounds me how the rest of their bodiesincluding their wings, tail, and feetall had the same texture as human skin. After further observation, I could also see that their chest and shoulders are swollen, which I imagined is how they could manage to flap their gigantic wings so quickly.

It seemed like the winged creature was eating one of those snail-like humanoids we saw earlier, so it didn’t really mind us much, but not for long.