The Black Death, continued…

formerly Dacia,

the territory near the Black Sea, on the boarder of what would become Hungary and Romania.

The Count and the countryfolk

“It wasn’t ‘Vlad the Dragon,’ nor his son, ‘Vlad iii’ who we had issue with.

“No: our concern was with another Count within the region.”

“Another wealthy “noble” type, whose interests were threatened by the rebellious workers, subsistence level wage earners, who were also being crushed to death by taxation. For it was the simple peasant farmer, or textile worker, taxpayer, who was at the heart, the foundation, or the soul of the land, their land, and who’s bounties and labors are the source of the wealth, which all men covet, and which had made all these men “Kings,” and ‘noble rulers’ of others in the first place—and ravenous wolves most of the time too. That much is obvious.”

Our story concerns an aberration of the natural timeline; a Count in league with trans-dimensional intelligences, and in Transylvania, a guy named ‘Lord Girthwand.’

Yes. You read that right.

He is some kind of jester in the pecking order, not taken seriously, of this dark hierarchy he was a clown, and that doesn’t make him any less dangerous—apparently according to ‘this’ hierarchy jesters rank quite highly… in power. In his madness he can unzip the fabric of reality, as if it were all some cartoon and drawing, all of reality, and he can zip through to another layer, which is ever-present, transporting him to some other place in the world of man, or to realms of the mind of his creation—realms of cartoon madness and bizarre sights and feverish nightmarish-clowns.

… they’re mocking and satiric little creatures who make up ‘this’ pecking order. There’s no hierarchy they’re aware of. They are fizzling stars, magnificent though short-lived, unable to properly bow to any hierarchy and so the elect left him in the darkness… These little creatures , the clown ones, are also the ones potent enough to bestow this power unto the ‘Fangs,’

Within Transylvania, at the brink of the Transylvanian Peasant Revolt:

“Why are you always asking me about the Shadowy Figure, Pinterquest?!”

Pinterquest: “Well it’s inherently interesting sir.”

Pinterquest was abnormally small.

He always had a mop, or a broom, upon which he leaned slightly, and he always brought this up…

“Who is this entity? I mean—how does he or she have the power to do all this?”

He had a point, and a pint, earlier, it was very interesting.

“Isn’t it obvious to you that all this would be interesting to me? I mean, to an admitted simpleton like me, who believes in superstitions, like with coins, and smoke and mirrors tricks, and the like, and who wants to appeal to said gods in order to gain profits, herein, with no concern on the consequences for my eternal soul, whilst enduring this mortal coil?”

The Count: “What is it you want to know? Can I can get you an alcoholic beverage, and wouldn’t it would be just as captivating for you as knowing about my endeavors in amateur conjuration?”

Pinterquest: “And it really comes?”

The Count: “Yes, it really comes.” …

“Some think it’s Charon, from the Greek myths, who was the ferryman of the dead and drove a boat upon the River Styx—and some others think it’s Cain, from the Jewish Bible.”

He shrugged.

“You only see it that one time, anyways, the time you first turn…apparently.”

…said the Count. “I haven’t done it yet, so I haven’t see him for myself.”

…

…

It was a Phoenician deity …

…seems to be less powerful of a foe than the the one which we face and have now lurking around our cemeteries and…

and that which we have been devoting all of our resources, of the Organization on the Palatine Hill, the Nexus, to tracking down and neutralizing.”

“This ‘god,’ or ‘devil,’ seems to be able to open portals completely at will.”

“The destinations are also completely at this entity’s mere selection, unlike the mega-portal that we had acquired from Baal Hammon*?, the god Melqart, from Carthage, this seems to be a portal-generating entity itself…hence the theory of it being Charon or Cain.”

It seems that making pathways is central to this being, inherently, and it is intrinsic and woven into the very fabric of this ‘spirit’, it’s nature, this ‘nous’ pure intellect—and part of the core of its being, so it has great powers in this our arena.”

“Having been a fallen-entity, it is subject to an enormous set of rules in which it can operate, as are we. But it can operate, indeed, and it does. It was permitted to operate, but behind these impenetrable bounds which are established…

“We are having trouble with it.”

“However, there also seems to be an odd quirk, an exploit, about this portal selection process…”

“…it seems this arch-devil is only…

“…making the choice itself, and with the creature’s free-will, truly unimpeded by certain specifications this arch-devil, lord over the creature, though in clever obfuscation, simply watches from the shadows, silently, waiting as this mad-hatter re-emerges to the dismal place, and to those shallow dins of suffering, misery, and conflict from which he had come…”

“The Order on the Palatine established what is known as the ‘Janus Nexus.’ Now their order is ubiquitous. Almost nobody is aware of us.”

…

Fangs: “The creature neither desires to know the functionality behind his newly acquired ability, nor cares at all, or in any way. The frenzy of turning never really fades entirely, he at first merely enjoys the raw feeling of power, like going a week long drug-binder, but in a day, and as a consciousness slowly re-gains the creature sleeps and the man is again waking—from what’s been termed its ‘nosferatu’ phase, where he hits rock bottom of the total transformation process…”

“A creature turned is only a fully-fledged vampire once this ‘nosferatu’ stage has been completed.”

“Like puberty, in the development stage of humanity, these young vampires must first suffer a rebellious phase, instead of hormonal chemicals these are the dark spirit of pubesence, a chaotic gauntlet—a phase of mania, and discontent, and as a testing grounds before going further and settling into their quintessential aged form, the ‘Citizen Kane’ vampire moment, it is a calm, melancholy after the wild and pathetic frenzy, out of confusion, fear, struggling with an ignorance, in their eyes like a teenage phase after the fact.”

“Typically once deep within whatever dining halls, of whatever Castle or Fortress or Keep they have chosen as their palace, and place of dwelling, it is just as inevitable and predictable an outcome as the stages before it.

“Once the Janus Nexus had been established, to combat some of this assault upon the natural order of things, it seems the ante had been greatly magnified.”

“In virtually the same instant that we find the ability to travel through these portals, across time and space, we came across an entity which can literally do the same, at will.”

“This entity seems to go through the typical path that these creatures had gone through when we first encountered them.”

“They have a falling out upon their ‘historic death’, and once risen from the grave they are white-eyed, zombie-like creatures, termed ‘Nosferatu,’ which seem manic, or frenzied, and run, attacking wildly, and are indeed quite formidable foes… for the Paladin.

“It is sometimes easier within the next phase, actually, to dispatch these fanged creatures once they have regained some shred of their former consciousness and have therefore given a short window of opportunity in their grief stage to make the drop on them; cruel, calculated, nevertheless necessary, all can be answered “yes.” The misery and grief only expands across the void they see as time, and they seek to continue to exist and they know not why. They merely stand in such a state of power, which is only growing by their continued existence, their bargain with the devil now, perhaps, a curse…