Chapter Text
Roxanne could still hear the words Dr. Humberflound had spoken as she left his bunker, “… There is something else in that manor, I know it, and it is far worse than any of its spectral neighbors…”
Those words had sent a small chill down her spine when he had spoken them; she knew the doctor did not fear much in the way of spirits and the undead, after all, he studied the supernatural. But he seemed almost afraid when he spoke of the thing in the manor, yet he still couldn’t tell her just what it was, only that it was there. And Roxanne knew better than not to heed a warning from the doctor, no matter how he acted or felt.
She contemplated his words as she rode along a trail to the gloomy manor, allowing Nefertiti to run free while Roxanne just sat back and let the horse do her job. They passed by many trees whose branches were bare and empty, as if they were all stuck in a perpetual autumn despite being in the middle of summer. And a storm had begun to brew overhead and cast the land in an even greater darkness than it had been when the sky was clear.
The ground became wet and muddy as rain began to fall, and the wind began to pick up, rustling the trees and their branches, making them wave like they were alive. Ravens and bats could be heard cawing and screeching overhead, likely trying to get out of the weather before it got any worse than it already was. While off in the distance, wolves could be heard howling and calling out to one another in the fog.
But soon enough, Nefertiti would stop as she came upon the manor, and Roxanne would finally look up from and take a long look at the building.
The Evershade Manor was a large manor with about three or four stories to it. The exterior was an unwashed grey that looked old and worn out, like it had sat here for a long time. A couple of the windows looked to have been either cracked or smashed in places, allowing the night air and rain to get in. But the lights were on in the manor, almost all the windows had the warm glow of either torch or candlelight shining through them, casting their ominous light onto the front courtyard. The frontmost courtyard was almost as wide as the manor was; all of it was fenced in with a couple of fountains and trees in the yard, as well as a little garden in front of the front porch that hadn’t been well-maintained.
Roxanne would shove herself off Nefertiti and step up to the gate to the manor, which held a thick chain and lock, which would make it difficult for anyone to try to enter this place without permission or without being noticed.
Grunting an acknowledgement, she took the chain and lock in her hand, then wrapped it around her arm, making sure it was good and tight. Roxanne gave a single strong tug, ripping both chain and lock on the gate off with ease.
Roxanne would then push open the gate and walk through, with her steed following close behind into the courtyard. But as they walked into the courtyard, both rider and steed could feel it, that same smothering presence she’d felt in the presence of the corrupted shard, but it was far stronger than the one that she’d already purged. That put her off and made Nefertiti all the more hesitant to follow any closer than she had to or be near this place.
“I feel it too, Nefertiti… I feel it too…” Roxanne soothed her horse as she stepped closer to the manor.
“I see the stables, come along, unless you want to remain out here in the rain…” Roxanne insisted as she walked away, and Nefertiti followed.
The stables were off on the right side of the building, just where they wouldn’t be seen unless you were already in the courtyard. It was a long and low building that, like the manor, looked old and worn and half ready to fall over, yet it still held steady somehow, even in this weather. Inside the stables were a couple of stalls for horses; the wood was rotten, but still sturdy, and the roof thankfully didn’t leak.
Roxanne led Nefertiti into one of the nicer-looking stalls and closed it to ensure the mare didn’t intend on leaving any time soon, with or without Roxanne, and Roxanne went about searching the stables for any of the equipment that the doctor claimed to have left behind. And to her luck, Roxanne found not only a fully working shotgun, none too dissimilar to hers, though it had a pump instead of a lever, but it also had a full belt of shells, each loaded with iron shavings and rock salt. Then, not far from the gun, she had located an open bag of rock salt that looked like it was about half full, next to a pile of old hay, though she couldn’t find any iron that wasn’t in pieces.
“This is perfect, well, almost perfect. I still need to find some iron, and something to stamp the shells together…” Roxanne whispered to herself as she set the bag of salt off to the side.
She was just about to walk back out to the manor to go searching for what else she needed when she heard Nefertiti’s neighing from behind her, beckoning Roxy’s attention.
“What is it, girl?” Roxanne asked, concerned why her horse would call out to her like that, and saw the mare motion for something.
Roxanne would look to where Nefertiti was motion and would sigh when she was pointing to the hay pile in the corner, “That is what, it is old and wet. And besides, you don’t even need to eat…”
The horse just snorted in response, practically begging Roxanne to give her some, like she would die again if she didn’t have any, and after a long moment, Roxanne finally relented.
“Fine, but if you have a stomachache, don’t go whining to me about it!” Roxanne huffed as she placed a couple of armfuls in the stall with her steed.
Having satisfied the drama queen that was her horse, she stepped out into the courtyard and the rain to check the manor. But something was in the courtyard with her; she could sense it, and she kept her eyes peeled around her as she marched further into the courtyard. Roxanne could practically hear it in the wind, but it remained just where she couldn’t see it, and it was cold, that she knew, it was cold and smelled of old clothes and candlewax.
Having finally caught on to where it was, Roxanne whipped around with the spare shotgun out and pointed towards it. But it moved just as she caught a glimpse of it; it was invisible, or at least it would’ve been to anyone else, but Roxanne’s eyes could see it as clear as day. It was a pale ghost, a solitary spirit that was stalking her in the courtyard; it looked roughly like a mortal, with two arms, two legs, and a head with eyes and a mouth. But there was little more than that, no real discernible features other than that.
Most spirits, despite being capable of altering their forms at will, seldom remembered who they once were in life, so in death, they’d wander until they’d find something that would remind them of their past selves and the living for the warmth of life.
The spirit moved off to one of the trees on the edges of the courtyard, as if it was trying to hide from Roxanne, almost like it was afraid of her.
Seeing this skittish spirit, she would begin to lower her barrel, but not drop it, in case it was a ploy to get her to drop her guard.
“I’m not going to hurt you, not if you don’t make me…” Roxanne called out to the spirit carefully, stepping closer to the spirit.
It didn’t move, it would move, it just watched her from behind the tree with those hollow eyes that could’ve been looking at everything and nothing. Its mouth didn’t move either; either it didn’t have any words to say, or it didn’t remember how to speak at all. But she noted a small detail about it when it looked at her, there were the barest hints of a smile on her face, that only grew wider the longer she stared at it, the longer attention remained solely in that one spirit.
Thinking quickly, Roxanne whipped around and raised her gun, seeing that behind her was a second spirit, with its arms outstretched, with a rock in its hands. Roxanne fired once in the center of the ghost’s chest, and the mixed shrapnel of the salt and iron sent it reeling backward and made it drop the rock it had been planning to smash her with. Then she pumped another shell as she twirled towards the one that’d been baiting her, and fired at the now charging spirits, catching it in the face.
The salt and iron would certainly stink the spirits, but they neither had the power to kill nor banish them; it did disorient them for a moment, and she would have to take advantage of that moment. She ran up to the one that she’d just shot while it was dazed and would wrap her hands around its throat, lifting it high above her. It struggled in her grip and tried to pry itself away, but it found it couldn’t break away from her.
“Please don’t work…” she pleaded for her little spell not to work as she opened her mouth.
The marking on Roxanne’s shoulder reappeared and glowed with emerald light as she opened her mouth wider, and from the back of her throat came similar light. The ghost face twisted in a mask of horror as it felt itself being pulled into her throat by an unearthly force that it could resist, and its form rippled like water as it was pulled. Then once Roxanne let go of the spirits, its whole aethereal form slipped into her max in a flash before she closed, swallowing, devouring the lost soul.
Roxanne turned back towards the other ghost that was watching, horrified by what it’d seen the golden-eyed woman do to its former comrade.
The ghost floated back slightly as the shadows seemed to lengthen around it and Roxanne, and before it could run, a ghastly claw shot from Roxanne’s hand and latched itself around it. With a slight tug, Roxanne pulled both the hand and the spirit towards her with unnatural speed. And she would open her mouth once more as the spirit was pulled in like its accomplice was, disappearing into the back of her throat with a faint glow.
With both ghosts gone, Roxanne let out a groan of both annoyance and discomfort. Annoyance for the fact that her spell had, in fact, worked and allowed her to devour two whole spirits. And discomfort, because said two spirits were writhing and thrashing about within her, having not been destroyed, but merely contained within Roxanne’s stomach.
A soft glow came from within her stomach that would only be seen if you had been looking for it. Though upon inspection, there was no other discernable change to Roxanne’s form, not yet at least. Roxanne could also feel the lingering taste of the ectoplasm in the back of her mouth, a sour, slimy taste that she knew wouldn’t go away any time soon.
However, she still had a job to do, so she made her way to the door of the manor, stepping up the porch and through the door into the main foyer of the building, a square room with many paintings hanging on the walls and a pair of empty standing between the door that led further into the manor.
Giving the room a quick look over, she noticed that a door off to her left held a sign that read ‘Storage & Workshop’ in the doctor's handwriting, and that made Roxanne smile, knowing the doctor labels and names everything.
As she crossed the room to the door, Roxanne couldn’t help but notice that the helmets of those knights seemed to move on their own, following Roxanne’s every move, something that, for now, she just had to ignore.
Stepping into the workshop, Roxanne found the room to be full of pieces of metal and tools splayed out across a couple of tables against the walls. Most of the ones on the table were either unfinished or broken. While in the corners of the room were crates full of metal, iron, copper, and bronze, there was also a smelting pot and an anvil in this room beside the far wall, which looked to have been redecorated to have a door to let air in. And this perplexed the witch, because she didn’t think that Dr. Humberflound would partake in smithing. But she did know that the doctor would often have assistants helping with his research, and perhaps one of these assistants was versed in metalworking.
Giving the room a quick look, she quickly found an entire bag of iron shavings and a bag of empty shell casings, they were half full like the bag of rock salt, but Roxanne didn’t care, she had what she needed. But she had also found a worn leather satchel on the workers’ table, one that dripped with magic, and it gave Roxanne an idea. First, she stuffed the bags and all the half-built inventions into the satchel, watching the darkness within swallow them up till it became quite heavy. After she tied the satchel to her waist, she would have easy access to its contents.
“Perfect, now I just need to grab that bag of rock salt and Nefertiti, then we can head back to the doctors and figure out what the rest of this stuff can do.”
She was about to walk out the door when she caught herself in the reflection of the window, and she stepped toward the window, seeing that her hair was drenched and disheveled. Quickly, she fixed her hair with her hand, brushing it back and trying to get it back to what it had looked like before she had left that evening. But that was when she heard a crash and movement outside the door, drawing her attention back to her task at hand.
Quietly, she cracked the door open just enough so that she could peek through and see whatever was on the other side, and caught the tail end of a couple of the ghosts going through the doors.
Remaining quiet, Roxanne followed the specters through those doors and down a long, narrow hallway that was lined with suits of armor that didn’t seem to move to Roxanne. As silently as she could, she opened the door and caught about three ghosts floating about the main hall, seemingly conversing in the language of the dead, before one of them ran off into another part of the manor to the right. All that now remained were the two ghosts who floated around the chandelier, still conversing quietly.
Debating what to do, Roxanne checked the ammunition within her shotgun, finding three shells remaining, and she knew that the one on her backside was still full. She looked back at the pair of ghosts, considering whether or not she should engage with them or leave them for the time being. They were just floating there; they weren’t paying any attention to their surroundings. Besides, just already had what she needed for the meantime, she could come back for them later.
Just when she decided to leave, she heard a small creak of metal behind her and turned just in time to see one of the suits of armor move and bash her in the head with a shield.
Roxanne skidded across the floor of the manor and into the great hall, just below the chandelier, which was now hurtling down towards her. She managed to roll out of the way as it crashed into the floor, missing her by a few hairs, and saw a ghost staring down at her intently. Knowing her other shotgun had been knocked away when she went through the door, she drew the second one and shot up at the pair, hoping to at least catch one of them with some of the pellets. But alas, they floated aside before she could catch them, missing them entirely, and they disappeared from her sight.
Those clanking footsteps returned, coming straight for her with a vengeance. It was the knight, brandishing a large pole axe, and raising it high bring it down on her. But she kicked out with one of the legs, making the hollow suit topple over as she got back up fully. By the time it managed to pull itself back together, Roxanne had retrieved her other gun, reloaded it, and began unloading shell after shell into the knight. While a single shell of salt and iron certainly would not have been enough to harm the armor, a half-dozen shells would at least leave a dent in more than just armor.
Eventually, when the armor had been damaged enough and the specter within certainly dazed, did she grab the suit and take a deep breath, practically slurping the ghost out of its shell and into her gullet. That left the other two that tried to drop the ceiling fan on her, and they had certainly returned, but this time they had brought about a dozen at most. She dropped the now-empty gun and pulled out her other shotgun and loaded a shell into the chamber.
“Alright then, let’s dance…” she said as the ghosts all converged on her.
She started blasting with, not really aiming, as she knew eventually she’d hit something, and she certainly did, the ghosts made the poor decision of banding a little too close together, allowing Roxanne to converse shells. Occasionally, one would manage to avoid the spray and would get awfully close to the would-be ghost hunter, but thankfully, she still could touch the ghosts and would manage to bat them aside with a swing of her fist. And one by each of them was dazed and then devoured, joining the rest of the accomplices within minutes of the last, until finally all of them were gone, being devoured entirely.
Roxanne herself was nearly out of shells by the time she was done, with one meager shell left over from her dance. And all of her dancing partners now tousled and wrestled within her stomach, which itself had lost its toned look and began to look ever so slightly bloated, with multiple small glows wriggling beneath her pale flesh. She placed a single hand upon her stomach and felt the slight curve begin to form, and could only sigh, knowing that if she were to continue, it’d only grow.
But for now, she was just going to return to the doctor before more of the fiends showed themselves, but she did retrieve the second shotgun, feeling that she might have some use for it.
She stepped back out into the rain and found Nefertiti still within the stall Roxanne had left her in, and the horse seemed more curious when Roxanne showed back up with a light show in her stomach.
“Don’t ask, or you’ll be next…” was all Roxanne would say as she stuffed the back of salt safely into her satchel.
Nefertiti, the zombie horse, just snorted as Roxanne let her out of her stall and hopped onto her back, and they rode off back towards Dr. Humbleflound’s bunker.