Ending H

Inflorescence

Just like how the black changes the humans, it also affects the plants. On this soil, that has seen countless deaths, that curious flower once started blooming. It requires fertile ground to grow to its full bloom and there is no better source of life than humans.

- The New Gods, when asked about the Brain Flower.

Warnings: Horror/Suspense, Body Horror, Face and Eye Trauma, Graphic Description

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You didn't know if you should have felt fear or relief upon seeing a humanoid silhouette in the humid, dark fog of the Thicket. You knew you had delved too deep and that it was only a matter of time before you were killed, but you still had the faintest shimmer of hope that you would at least not die alone and in this godsforsaken tree. Still, you held your voice back and swallowed it, now realizing how the shadow of a person twitched and shambled their way towards you, or at least in your direction. The tap, tap, clack of metal dragging on the semi-hard, wooden roots and branches of the tree's insides inspired a primal fear inside of you that weakened your knees and anchored you in place.

A distorted voice called out in the fog, different from the light, singsong ones that seemed to follow you wherever you go. Deeper, more faraway sounding. Muffled as though spoken through a thick wall, from behind a gag and with your ears full of cotton. It didn't have the same lilt as the other voices, not whimsical and alluring but totally unnerving and it set off every alarm within your mind that you were in danger and that you needed to move. But you didn't. You couldn't, or so you thought. You took a half step back, looking forward with wild eyes that darted around in the darkness, trying to make sense of the figure that was becoming more and more apparent the closer it became.

Not one of those strange, feminine-esque monsters but a man, clear as day. Your eyes couldn't search his frame because they were solely focused on the bulbous protrusion that rested atop of his shoulders. It fully encapsulated his neck and head, giving no indication of who exactly he was, though his dress would suggest he was a foreigner in these lands and in this dark place. The yellow colour of the strangeness was an eyesore and you couldn't look away from it or the pinkish-red, seemingly fleshy petals, or perhaps leaves, that rose up from the man's shoulders like some kind of collar. Over his shoulder rested a bow, its strings frayed and quiver arrowless. In his left hand, a hatchet, worn and seemingly something he did not carry with him in the dungeon. His movements were unstable and jerked in an unnatural manner. Again, you heard the muffled voice, only this time it was louder, though no less clear to you.

"H-H-Huh-?" Your heart freezed in your chest. The noise was incomprehensible, barely recognizable as a voice at all. You couldn't discern whether or not there was any urgency in the voice's tone or if it was flat or droning. The person- a man- continued to shamble forward, not unlike a ghoul recently resurrected through necromancy, though there was a stiffness in his movements that would nearly suggest that, perhaps, he wasn't as willing of a participant in his actions as one might think.

"Mmmm... Mmmm... Mmmhmmm..." The man stumbles to a stop before you. You have your hand on your weapon, trembling hard enough that your armour shudders and clatters together.

"D-D-Don't come a-any c-c-closer-!" The man doesn't move, nor does he stop mumbling, or humming, unintelligibly. The protrusion on his head begins to swell slightly. You take a step back, then two, then just as you're about to turn and run, the man's body jerks violently.

POP!!

The release of pressure from within the engorged pustule was forceful enough to rupture your eardrums. Instantly, you are crippled with pain and a nauseating sense of vertigo, crumpling to the ground and screaming, a sound not unlike the aftermath of a ringing bell humming in your ear as your vision clouds. The throbbing mass atop the man's shoulders had finally succumbed to whatever grew within it, a thick shroud of noxious yellow fumes enveloping both you and him. But... no, it's not gas or... pus. It was thick but not wet, not dry, either, with a chunky appearance not unlike pus, though it was flaky and drifted slowly down from the ceiling in clumps that stuck to your hair and your eyelashes. You lay on the ground, curled in a ball with your hands covering your ears, vainly trying to silence the painful ringing in them. Whatever that substance was, it stuck to your nose and the inside of your mouth and the back of your throat and left you unable to breathe.

"Haa... Haa... Haa..." Your breaths came out in short wheezes. The ringing in your head did not cease, nor did your dizzying nausea, but you suddenly felt the world shift on its axis and you felt as though you were about to slip off the ground. The man stumbled forwards, all but tripping over your body. Your eyes are thick with tears and stick together with what was pollen, not bodily fluids.

The man was once an Outlander, hailing from the Kingdom of Oldegård. Like you, he delved too deep and succumbed to one of the many corrupted flora of the Dungeon of Fear & Hunger. The brain flower seems rather innocuous, being a flowering plant that would seem harmless, though like all things that come into the darkness of the Dungeon, the brain flower was as dangerous as its more lively, monstrous counterparts. It attacks the nervous system, most notably from the brain. It was unclear whether or not its hosts were still conscious or even 'alive', though the mumblings heard from the hosts and how they seem to strain against the flower's control makes one wonder just how 'dead' they truly are.

It awkwardly grabbed at you, flipping you on your back as you gasped for air. You put visible effort into trying to fight back but you couldn't so much as raise your arms or kick your legs out, even as the monstrosity leaned over you, its disgusting yellow pustules now peeled away, revealing a pinkish-red blob that was mounted over a disfigured skull that was swollen and throbbed rhymically. The man's face was unrecognizable and even through your tears and blurry vision knew that it was something terrible to behold and made you physically ill to witness. You squirmed and struggled but found your body failing you and revolting against your control.

"N-Nuuu- H-Ha-! HA! HA!" Your eyes are wild and wide and streaming with slimy tears. Root-like structures peek out from the creature's half-opened maw, between broken teeth and a swollen tongue and pallet that barely gave room for it all to come slithering out. It brushed against your spittle-covered lips and crept into your mouth in spite of your best efforts to close your mouth and turn away.

The grip on your shoulders was painfully tight. Your skin bruised and your bones creaked. You couldn't breathe. You tried to clench your teeth. You tried to kick, to thrash, to do something- anything- but did nothing other than stare through your unfocused eyes at the matted red hair that clung to a bloated head that barely resembled a human being anymore. Your lungs screamed for air. Your brain screamed for it. Your teeth rattled and your jaw trembled, a clacking emanating from behind your lips as you fought against the urge to open your mouth and just-

"H-HAA-!!!"

Sharp vines spear into every orifice of your face. Your mouth was filled, your nose, your ears, your eyes... It carefully penetrated you, creeping and slithering against your eyeballs, puncturing the delicate, soft plates that protected every part of your face against any invading force that would somehow seek one of your most precious organs. Your brain. Your struggling slowed to a stop until you lay still, only the occasional twitch from your body as your brain was violated and things were scrambled and pierced that should never be touched. A sickening squelch and crunch echoed within the Thicket, your blood and an opaque fluid that leaked from your nose and ears and eyes pooling underneath you and seeping into the lower levels of the Great Tree.

The movement of the monstrosity's vines slowed then seemed to stop all together. The body of the Outlander slumps against your own, face pressed against yours in a sort of mockery of two lovers embracing one another in their final moments. Already your head has begun to swell, a sickly yellow hue rising on your cheeks and in your eyes. The man's body is now still, small buddings where the blistered pustules once resided on his skull now sprouting and rising at a steady rate. For minutes, or hours, or days, even, your body festers as rotten yellow-red flowers bloom and fully split his skull open, a puff of pollen being released into the Thicket where it would likely be carried further into both the Tree and into the Dungeon.

Your body reacts to the pollen, twitching and contorting as you try to rise from your postmortem resting place. Your joints creak, your tendons snap and your head is so heavy from cerebrospinal fluid and pollen that your body tips this way and that as you try to balance your body. You take up the hatchet the Outlander had dropped and stumbled deeper into the Thicket, dumbly looking for another host for the parasite that held your entire body hostage. Your throat and mouth is so swollen that you cannot speak, but still there are whispers that echo within the Thicket that don't sound unlike a person begging, pleading from behind a thick wall, from behind a gag, underneath an earful of cotton.

You died.

Ending H- Inflorescence