After four days on the road, the Geiger relic chimed. They had arrived at the border of the Carrhae Zone. The area looked no different from the rest of Huma. Silver birch trees grew in abundance, painting the landscape with a mesmerizing view of white and black against a backdrop of orange and red.

  The wagon’s driver brought the horses to a halt. “Can’t go any further,” he called out, hearing the Geiger relic chime.

  Claudia donned her helmet. “Alright, everyone off. We’re on foot the rest of the way.”

  The wagon sped off back toward civilization, leaving them alone. “Mostafa, unfurl the map,” Boris said.

  Pulling a cylindrical scroll case from his back, he popped the top off and pulled out a large stretch of parchment. It was a rougher copy of a map of the region. It displayed old roads, rough locations of where towns used to be, and even some landmarks. “If I’m correct, we’re here,” he said, pointing to the bottom of the map. “If we go northwest, we should find the town of Boreana, if it’s still there.”

  Claudia reached out to one of the silver birch trees, resting the Geiger relic on a branch. It made only a handful of chimes over several minutes. The radiorum was barely detectable. “We should be safe to travel. The Geiger relic says it is safe.”

  Heading northwest into the Carrhae Zone, they saw and heard very few sounds. The occasional gust of wind rustled the tree leaves, but no birds sang their songs. A couple of insects barely the size of a thumb buzzed by. Curiously, Claudia’s gaze followed the insects briefly. They seemed to thrive.

  At the base of one of the birch trees was a weird-looking plant. Supported by a thin but tall stem, a pair of flaps hung open, looking like a set of cooking tongues. Claudia approached the small plant and poked the needles protruding from it. Suddenly, the flaps clamped shut. Poking it again, she saw nothing else happen. The novelty of the strange little plant wore off rather quickly, and she resumed her walk.

  Despite the crinkling of the map behind her, the walk northward remained quiet. Sunflowers grew in abundance, craning their barren faces toward the sky on stiffened stalks. Some sunflowers had two heads. The confessor walked up to one of the double-headed flowers and examined it. The petals had fallen off, leaving behind its brown core. As she walked around it, she kicked something rigid. Her big toe ached in pain for a minute. Dusting the petals and dirt aside, she saw a weathered but nearly rectangular stone. Half buried in the ground, the stone stretched a foot wide and on its face, no engravings remained.

  Claudia turned around and called back to the other three men, “I found something!”

  Boris, Morgan, and Mostafa quickly rushed over and stared at the stone. Boris knelt down and pulled out an entrenching tool from his pack, trying to wedge it beneath the stone. Instead, the tool kept hitting the sides of the stone. “It’s a lot bigger than it looks,” he said.

  Mostafa lowered the map. “Nothing on the map that says there should be anything here. Do you think it’s an old gravestone?”

  “If it is, it must be newer,” Morgan added. “I don’t think old gravestones would last six or seven thousand years out in the open.”

  Claudia put her hand to the face of the gravestone. “Saint Klaria, watch over this grave,” she prayed in a low whisper. “Guide the one who rests here to Torcall’s side.”

  For a moment, beneath all the armor and clothes she wore, she felt a puff of wind drag across her hand and fingers. She pulled her hand back from the gravestone, removed the gauntlet, and examined her hand. Nothing had changed. She then pulled the Geiger relic out from its carry case and set it down on the gravestone. It did not chime nor did the indication needle flinch.

  “Something off, confessor?” Boris inquired.

  Claudia shook her head. “No, everything is alright.” Beneath her tall, faceless helm, she smiled. She had no idea that there was a soul trapped inside it, but feeling that caress on the hand, she now knew that what was there, is now released and at peace. Her heart felt lifted, giddy even. “Mark this spot down on the map as an abandoned cemetery.”

  Mostafa whipped out a charcoal pencil and some spare paper and began writing a note.

  Continuing onward for another hour, Mostafa picked up the pace to get alongside Claudia. “Ma’am, the first town should be just another couple of minutes.”

  She nodded. “If there’s anything left of it, we shall make camp there for the day.”

  However, when they arrived at the rough idea of where the town should be, they found nothing but nature. Despite the radiorum, nature had reclaimed the area in its entirety. Except for one pillar made of cobblestone and mortar. Dead vines clung to it, creating a mesh of withered fibers. They all approached it. The pillar stood around six feet tall and about two feet wide. It looked old but like the gravestone earlier, not old enough to have been part of the original town.

  “Still want to make camp? My portable sundial says we still got three more hours of daylight,” Boris commented.

  “I do not believe that this is all there is to see.” Claudia brushed her sabaton against the ground, kicking aside leaf litter and dirt, but found only more dirt. “I think it best to set up here while we still have light.”

  As her traveling cohorts unpacked their tents and sleeping bags, Claudia wandered a little way away from them. The trip had been quiet, not so much from the lack of action and eureka-variety discoveries but from the absence of conversation. She’d conversed more with corpses than with them. She felt bored with the expedition. Yesterday’s self thought it would be one discovery after another.

  She removed her helmet and took a deep breath, filled with the scent of the dusty and dry autumn season. Between the sprawling fields of sunflowers and sparse clusters of silver birch trees, she’d find patches of wilted tall grass all dried up and retired for the season.

  Clunk

  Her head snapped down toward the ground. Her sabaton kicked something. Brushing the grass aside, she found an old circular handle affixed to a rotting wooden trap door. She reached down and pulled up on it, ripping the handle off the apparently locked hatch. She jabbed the bottom of her staff into the hatch door, punching all the way through. As she ripped it back out, the rest of the door collapsed in on itself and plummeted into the space below. Claudia opened the staff’s gothic head and removed the spent incense in it and replaced it with a lit candle. Through the same windows that incense smoke would billow out of, instead came candlelight.

  It was only a six-foot drop, which was easy enough for her. Once down in the basement, she leaned her staff toward the walls to get a sense of the scale of the space. It was small, but looked too new to be part of the pre-cataclysm town. However, the floor on which it stood upon appeared drastically different. Cobblestone and mortar, or some other concrete, formed the walls, while a mostly rigid blacktop surface formed the floor. She jabbed the staff at it and chipped off a piece. It felt squishy, malleable even. A closer examination with the aid of candlelight showed tiny rocks, smaller than most gravel, bound by some sort of tar or soft resin.

  She lowered the light to the ground and saw a white stripe go down the middle of it. It was segmented at equal distances. She took a few steps forward and tripped over something. She fell into the wall that then squished against the weight and then landed on her knees. Confused, she reached out and pushed against the wall. It gave way despite looking like pristine stone. She pulled a knife from her belt and slashed at it. The material cut easily, revealing some sort of soft yellow spongy material that lacked shape or density. Behind it was a wall of clean cut wood planks, stained with various glues, weathered and partially stripped paints and an innumerable amount of scuff marks and scratches.

  “Why would someone cover their walls with this flimsy stuff?” She asked herself aloud. Claudia grabbed a fistful of the stuff and yanked, tearing off a large amount. It squished and molded in her hand. It felt spongy and wet, likely from the moisture from being underground. She tossed the fragment aside and ventured deeper into the place. The hallway had two rotted doors on the right and a door at the end of the hallway. The first one she tried was at the end of the hallway, which did not open. Tree roots had grown into the door and held it shut. The metal knob for it, however free, spun on its mount. A glass window flanked the door’s left, but revealed nothing but dirt on the other side.

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  She turned around to look at the spot she came in from. A trap door in the ceiling, weird material on the walls and some variant of concrete as its floor screamed weird to Claudia. She opened the two doors on her left, revealing two emptied rooms with roots growing into it. Then it finally registered in her mind. She was standing in what could have very well been a pre-cataclysm house. Round glass hung tight against the ceiling with a small metal decoration coming out of the bottom. On the wall between the two doors was a small thumb-size lever. She flicked it.

  Nothing happened.

  The armored confessor walked back to the hatch and looked to her left. The setting sun cast a faint orange glow on previously unseen cabinets, revealing a pile of discarded moldy wood. Something among the scrap heap glimmered. Further examination revealed a small glass ashtray. The ash had long disappeared, but the brown tobacco smoke stains remained. She let out a disappointed sigh and tossed it. The glass shattered on the floor.

  Fortunately, there was an old crusty and rusted iron ladder mounted to the hatch frame. However, as she finished climbing out, the hatch’s frame gave up and collapsed, taking the ladder and part of the roof with it. The loud crashing noise brought her traveling companions to her side in a handful of seconds.

  “The hell happened, Claudia?” Boris asked between rushed breaths.

  The confessor jabbed her staff at the edge of the roof, watching flakes of rotting wood break off. “I found our missing town,” she said plainly.

  Mostafa squatted, trying to get a look into the old home. “That’s wild. Looks almost perfectly preserved.”

  “I think the rest of the town is buried underneath the dirt, but it’s far from preserved. This one was already empty and rotting on the inside.” She then turned to make her way back to the campsite. Unbeknownst to them, having the floor give out behind her shook her thoroughly. An eight-foot fall in that much armor would’ve crippled her. If there were more houses beneath the dirt in similar condition, she felt the need to put as much distance between her and the failing structures as possible.

  Before she could, however, she heard another resounding crash. Her head whipped right around to see another trap-door sized hole in the ground. The dirt layer was really no deeper than a matter of inches, providing no structure to the ground they walked upon. She hastily but carefully approached the edge of the hole and looked in. Morgan laid flat on his back, audibly groaning in pain. “Bucket, are you hurt?”

  Boris stood next to her and rolled his eyes. “Morgan!” he shouted. “I’m coming down.”

  The man climbed down as safely as he could and knelt beside Morgan, examining him for injuries. None of them were wearing their armor, aside from Morgan’s bucket helmet. His maul had bounced a few feet away. “I think he’s just had the wind knocked out of him,” Boris declared.

  However, they were not alone down there. As the sun set, the surrounding area grew ever darker and being eight feet in a hole in the ground gave them even less ambient lighting. Something suddenly felt off to Claudia as if she was being watched. Her eyes scanned the immediate area, but she saw no movement. “Do you see anything down there?” Her voice sounded elevated, sped up by growing concern.

  Boris picked up on it immediately and stood up, wielding his claymore. As he did, he locked gazes with a pair of glowing red eyes in the darker part of the home. “Get down here Confessor, we crashed into someone’s home.”

  Claudia jumped down, landing with a metallic thud. She extended her hand and threw a large sphere of light forward, illuminating the space. The light revealed a three foot, red-skinned imp with black talons on its sausage fingers and hooves for feet. It shied away from the light source as it flew past. The imp shrieked in an ear-piercing, high-pitched tone. She instantly recognized the creature’s colorations. It wasn’t just any hellish imp. It was a Mephistopheles imp. “That’s an imp of Mephisto!” She shouted, “Brace for a gorilla on steroids!”

  Despite its small three-foot stature and lack of wings, it possessed a powerfully muscular physique. Defying known biology, the creature’s abs displayed an eight-pack, biceps and triceps that make body builders look like commoners. Its arms were as long as the creature was tall, doing double duty as a set of front legs. The left corner of its mouth had suffered from extensive damage, showing teeth despite its lips being closed.

  Before the creature could respond, Claudia lit a match and threw it into the reliquary atop her gothic staff. The candle inside lit in a blaze of glory, fueled by the extra stick of the one-use match. She gripped the staff with both hands, holding it out in front of her, pressing her helmet to the reliquary. “Torcall, master of humankind, protect us against the scourge of Mephistopheles!” She bellowed the prayer for all to hear.

  Boris grinned and tightened his grip on the claymore. He felt his heart beat a little stronger and his mind clear of any doubts. Despite the lack of armor, he ran forward, crying aloud his ferocious war cry, a challenge to the imp. He swung the claymore with all his might. The blade dug deep into the imp’s shoulder, cleaving through the bone. With a hard yank, the blade cut across the muscle, leaving behind a gash several inches deep.

  The imp howled in pain and responded with a mighty punch to Boris’ face with the opposite fist.

  Boris immediately lost balance and bounced off the wall beside him, knocked to the floor in a daze.

  Morgan stood up and raised his steel maul. “Come at me, fiend!” he barked. With a quick sprint, he swung the mace and clobbered the imp across the head, bouncing it across the room. He wasted no time to get back to its side and slam the weighted head down on the monster. The creature’s ribs caved in with a resounding series of discomforting cracks.

  The imp still had the will to fight. Its eyes flared up with fiery brightness, and it threw a fist toward Morgan, hitting him square in the chest and knocking him back. It clambered upright and snarled. The creature’s left arm hung limp and useless, unable to move or support weight willingly. It lowered its head, bringing forward a pair of arm-thick horns. It charged forward and rammed into the man again, knocking him back even further and onto his rear.

  Claudia raised a hand and threw forward a sphere of erratic lightning. The full power of a natural lightning strike zapped and stunned the creature. The scent of charred flesh filled the space.

  Boris pushed himself upright. His head racked with pain. The creature stood motionless. It was his turn. White-knuckle gripping the claymore, he walked up to the creature with fierce determination and brought it down onto the imp’s head, cleaving it cleanly in half. The body went limp and toppled to the ground as blood and brain matter poured out onto the floor. Ensuring it stayed dead, he raised his foot and stomped down onto its head, splattering it everywhere. “There, it’s dead,” he spat. “Fucker.”

  “Are you two alright?” Claudia asked.

  Boris pressed his hand to his forehead, which did next to nothing to alleviate the migraine. “Some bedrest will suffice.”

  Morgan lowered the maul and leaned on it, using it as a pseudo-crutch. “Yeah,” he groaned. “Nothing’s broken, I don’t think.”

  From the world above them, Mostafa called down to them, “What is a Mephistopheles imp doing out here? I thought those were all extinct!”

  Claudia turned about. “Unfortunately for us, it seems they weren’t. If there’s one, there’ll be more.”

  “You’re a priest of Torcall. Can’t you just banish those?”

  “As if it were that easy. It takes less effort to kill it. Demons have no souls so once they’re dead, they stay dead,” she explained. “That said, I can make it easier to kill them.”

  Much like the other pre-cataclysm house, there was a ladder still affixed to the hatch frame and sturdy enough to get them all out. The sun had almost completely set, leaving them with just minutes of daylight. With haste, they ventured back to the campsite and built themselves a campfire to rest beside. Dinner comprised dried meats and water. Tough and way too salty to enjoy, the meat sat heavy in their stomachs.

  The campfire winded down; the flames reduced to fingers as it ate away at the last log on the coals. A chill and stiff breeze blew over the sight, giving a quick burst of life to the flames. Claudia rolled over in her wool-lined bedroll. It felt comfortable to the touch and held in the heat rather well. She felt her body grow evermore sluggish as her eyelids weighed themselves down. In the dim glow of the dying fire, she saw something amidst the wavy smoke plumes. Something stood there towering, its shape undefined, its face obscured, but its eyes, its beady red eyes, stared right through her. The last of her energy disappeared.

  “Man will always invent its own monsters. Man will challenge what it doesn’t understand, declare the unknown to be its next enemy. Not everything that lurks in the dark is evil. Not everything invisible is out to erase humanity. Sometimes it just exists, indifferent to everything around it. Beyond the safe borders of their cities is what humanity has always referred to as the world of barbarism. Out there is the world that they neglected. It is a product of their creation. If faith builds religions and fuels the gods and deities, then fear fueled the hells.”

  The voice sounded familiar. It spoke as if narrating a history book to a classroom of school kids. She could not speak. She sensed, although not able to see or feel in her dream state, something telling her to not speak.

  “Some would say that the gods painstakingly handcrafted each of our lifetimes. Some would dare make the assumption that every death is for a reason. The reality is death is a reaction to creation. The hells are a reaction to paradise, a single glob of pain and torment against the hundreds of realms of blissful heaven. As strong as the gods are, there are none that can erase the hellscape. There are none that can save the damned. Not. Even. You.”

  The woman lurched upright in her bedroll, panting hard. Her breath labored with the crispy cold-snapped air. It hurt to breathe until her lungs could adjust. The fire had long ceased smoldering and the warmth it emitted, gone entirely. The world around her silently breathed asynchronous to her own. Everything felt discomforting and overstimulating, like dragging icy feathers over every inch of skin. The only visible thing was the moon above in its full and illuminated glory.