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Post by Gandigan on Aug 16, 2023 1:57:45 GMT -5
When Gandigan opened his eyes, he found himself looking at an unfamiliar landscape. Fire and brimstone ruled the land here, and the creatures resembled animals more than people. A foul taste ran through his mouth, and when he looked down he could see that he had taken a hard landing. He had landed face first into rotted stone, and now blood was running across his tongue. He didn't have to wonder where he was: the Guiding Candle had worked, and now he roamed the streets of Hell.
The underworld of the afterlife was one of many places that people liked to speculate was the origin of the Mazoku. Mazoku in the old tongue did mean Demon, and so the connection was obvious. Some think that Namekians found a way to mate with their kind, while others think that there was some sort of conquest or mutation. Still others yet believe that it had nothing to do with Demons all together, and instead believe that the environment or some other outside factor caused the changes to occur.
Gandigan didn't much care for any of that right now. Right now his task was rather simple: find and capture a Demon. He and his little gang had discovered that Demons possessed a unique ability which allowed them to travel to the afterlife without any need for a Guiding Candle or other such devices. It was something innate to them; something in their blood, and now Gandigan and his crew wanted to figure out how to control it themselves.
It wasn't just the Demons who had this ability; according to some reports the Kais could do it too, but they were a lot tougher to get their hands on. A lowly Demon should do the trick just as well as some grand asshole, and then their plans only got bigger. Once Gandigan got his hands on a Demon he'd take it back to his gang where they'd run it through every test they could, breaking down it's blood and guts to find the secret to this dimensional travel ability.
Then they'd have no problem travelling to and from the underworld whenever they wanted, which would allow them to start recruiting. The Mazoku were always fighting amongst themselves; trying to unite them was a bigger pain than anyone wanted to deal with. But Hell? There were millions of Demons who'd love to run wild in the living world, and Gandigan was happy to give them the opportunity. As long as they vaguely followed in the direction that he and his gang pointed in there shouldn't be any issues.
Once they had their army then the sky was the limit. First would be the Outer Plait; it'd be much easier bringing the Mazoku into the fold with an army at their backs. Then the rest of Namek would fall too. With home secured the option of intergalactic conquest was a real possibility. All of these memories flooding into the mind of Gandigan made him feel a little... uneasy. Some where similar to what he had planned now; was this history manifesting itself again?
Maybe he couldn't really ever escape his past. Maybe it'd always come back to him no matter where he ran or what he tried to do. But if that was the case, why try and fight it? Maybe what he needed to do was embrace it. If destiny and fate were real then he was stuck in their stream, carried by the force of nature down to where he belonged. He couldn't say the idea made him happy, but if that's the way the world worked then there wasn't anything he could do about it.
"Hey... what are you doing? Standing around? You've got a memory to complete. The potion... it won't last forever you know." That voice came back into his mind; the voice of Balum, the sage who brought him here. It was annoying to have that voice ring around in his head, but the reminder was good: the memory wouldn't last forever, and Gandigan wanted to see it through to the end. He knew how he had gotten to Hell the first time now, but how had Amon taken him?
His body began to move now, heading off like it knew where to go. For a while Gandigan moved in autopilot, allowing his legs to take him where they would. Along the way he saw all sorts of strange creatures which could have fit the bill: winged bats with fangs as long as his arms, or black hydras emerging from a sea of flames. They were all Demons fit enough to take them from one realm to another, but all would have been a huge hassle to try and capture.
Gandigan was after something else right now; something he had already caught sight of. His brisk walk had turned into a sprint as soon as he laid eyes on it. Off in the distance he could see it running too. It looked like a rodent of some kind, but larger than anything Gandigan had seen before. It was probably the size of his torso, which still made it smaller than most other Demons around here. It moved fast though, and Gandigan could feel his body struggling to keep up.
Before long the Namekian found himself out of the stony prison he had first landed in, and was now wadding through desert sands. Hell was strange like a dream was; he couldn't say when or where the transition had happened, yet in his mind it all made sense. His feet felt heavy trying to push through the sand, and he knew he needed to fly if he wanted to continue. He had been warned that more energy expenditure might make the candle run out faster, but he didn't have much of a choice now.
Pushing off into the air, Gandigan was now honing in on his target. It was right there in front of him; he just had to put his hands out and grab it! But that's when it all fell apart. As the Namekian attempt to capture his prey it slipped from his grasp, slinking into a giant black pyramid that Gandigan had somehow failed to notice earlier. A small opening presented an escape route, but Gandigan was much too big to fit. A part of him wanted to turn back and look for something else, but the curiosity of what was within proved too strong.
Stepping inside revealed hundreds, if not thousands of lesser Demons mining away, collecting the black rock the pyramid was made from. Where they were taking it he couldn't say, but he had definitely found a good batch to choose from. Every Demon here was beneath him in terms of power; all he had to do was pick which one to take... at least that's what would have happened, had he not been chosen first. The Namekian's presence was no longer a secret.
A burning sensation took over Gandigan's body, and no longer could he move. "What's... going on!?" Suddenly every Demon in sight looked up at Gandigan before scattering away, leaving just one in sight. This one stood out from all the rest; it must have even more powerful than the Namekian was. It stood tall, and in the shape of a Humanoid with large wings stretching from it's back. The creature took it's time walking up to Gandigan, savoring his struggle along the way.
By the time it finally reached him most of Gandigan's strength had been sapped away by some foul magic. "A mortal? In my domain? What is this occasion?" Gandigan wasn't sure if he was really expecting an answer, but by now he was too weak to talk anyway. Instead he was forced to look on as the Demon examined him. "Powerful enough to make an impact I think. I've been in need of a vessel for far too long now; I suppose you'll have to do."
Vessel... he didn't much like the sound of that. "I... have been barred from entering you realm directly. A hex placed on me by the ancient lord Thoth, a being more powerful than you can imagine. He has humiliated me by locking me here, but now I have devised a way to escape... in a sense. I need someone else's body to do so however. Someone powerful enough to survive the process, which I think you might just be. I hope you don't mind a new addition to your body."
The Demon placed his claw on top of the chest of Gandigan, pushing down until he pierced the skin. He would have screamed if he had the strength, but all he could do was stand and watch. He thought the beast might tear him in half, until Gandigan opened his eyes again. He found himself on the floor of the old castle. He had collapsed out of exhaustion, and the rest of his Mazoku allies were now standing around him, looking at him with wide eyes.
"I'm... back?" He looked up at the others. "Yes... you've been back for a few days now, but we couldn't wake you before." Gandigan couldn't remember anything after that last encounter. "Well... I suppose you want to hear about what happened, right?" The others remained silent. "Actually, there's no need. We've already been informed." Gandigan was confused by that. Informed? Before he could ask two Mazoku had grabbed him by the arms and had picked him up.
"What are you doing? Unhand me now! I command it!" An elderly Namekian entered the room, and spoke a language that Gandigan didn't recognize. Before long he could feel his eyes beginning to fall, even though he tried to fight it. Looking around the room last time he could see many crates, though what they contained he didn't know. "I wanted to wait until you awoke again, Gandigan. To tell you that I'm sorry about this personally."
Tiredness was taking over his body bit by bit, until he was barely hanging onto consciousness. "You did well to lead us in the beginning, but let's be real here: we've stagnated. New leadership is required if we want to go further, and I'm not just talking about myself. Your plan was decent enough, but unleashing a horde of Demons until the world? There was no guarantee that we could control them at all, which is why we need one of their own to lead them."
The doors flew open, and several more Mazoku stepped forward. They now had Gandigan hoisted over their shoulders. "This Demon who captured you? He calls himself Amon. He isn't able to get to this realm himself, but he can still send messages through. Apparently he went through your mind before your Candle gave out and figured out what you had planned to do. After that he sent us a message and told us of his own plans, and how we might have a role to play in them."
The Mazoku carried Gandigan laid him out onto a table in central hall, before returning to the room they had been in before. "I believe the future that Amon speaks off is a great deal more likely to succeed than that of yours. He already has an army of Mazoku under his control. All we need to is provide him with a vessel that he can use to operate in our world. Once it's grown strong enough he'll be able to open up a portal to bring them all through."
More Mazoku re-entered the room, and two of them carried along a box with them. "Now I could have volunteered myself for this role, but... well, I wanted to actually see this new world myself. I figured you were probably the better candidate, and Amon seemed to agree. Now I hope you don't take this personally; really we're just trying to achieve the same thing that you were, except we're going to go about it in a much better way."
Two of the Mazoku moved to either side of Gandigan, digging their claws into his body along the same wound that Amon had left behind. Upon a signal each one pulled, tearing open Gandigan's ribs and awakening him from whatever spell he had been put under. "AHHHHHHHHHHHH!" He tried to break free, but several other Mazoku jumped forward and grabbed hold of his limbs, forcing back into place. "Damnit! Hold him in place would you?"
The Mazoku held him down while another reached into a crate pulled out what Gandigan feared most: Amon's parasite. It was much smaller than it had been when it burst from out of his chest, but it was still sickening all the same. It writhed around in the Mazoku's hand, and let out a high pitched whine that made his ears burn. "Now put it into his chest, right on top of the heart." The Mazoku grunts did as they were ordered, placing the worm creature inside of Gandigan's body.
At the same time he saw elder Mazoku walking around the table, chanting from the same tongue from before. He couldn't make out what they were saying, but he could feel the effects of their words. His body's natural regeneration was being pushed into overdrive, forcing him to deal the wound the Mazoku had created. Looking down he could see the parasite feasting away at his own insides; it was a feral creature without any sort of self control.
A few moments later and it slowed, as though had somehow been tamed. Maybe it was the words of the elders, or maybe it Amon reaching out from the underworld. In any case it stopped the consumption of Gandigan and instead wrapped itself around his heart, before digging into his spinal cord from below. That was the last he saw of it before his chest was fully healed, locking the creature in it's place. The process was now nearing it's end.
His body began to move again, and soon his skin would shift as well. The pigmentation began to darken to what it was today as Amon's essence slowly began to fill into him. But Gandigan was far from defeated; now he really kicked things into another gear. He thrashed and shook himself until finally he was able to break free of the Mazoku's grasp, and ironically it seemed as though Amon's power may have been helping him here.
Gandigan forced himself off of the table and back to his feet. Most of the Mazoku were frozen in fear, including their leader. It was as though they weren't sure how to act: was this the will of Amon or his Namekian slave they were witnessing? Gandigan looked around at the faces surrounding him, spotting someone familiar looking across from the other side of the room. A face almost hidden beneath a cloak, as old as he had ever seen.
"What are you doing? Grab him you fools!" It was too late for that; Gandigan had already made his way past the first wave of Mazoku defenders and out of the castle doors. That was when the memory came to an end, with Gandigan waking up back in Balum's hut. He didn't need to see any more; he already knew how that story ended. He wasn't really sure how he was supposed to feel after all of that, as so much had changed from what he had assumed.
He had been apart of that gang? And it was his idea to go to Hell? He could hardly believe it, yet that was exactly what he saw. "A very interesting tale I think." Gandigan jumped up from out of his seat and grabbed a hold of Balum. "You! You were... there. I saw you there!" Balum didn't look surprised, or even scared. Gandigan could have destroyed him in an instant if he wanted to, and left this entire village in dust. Yet Balum didn't blink.
"Of course I was there. There is no sage older nor wiser than I am. Your friends made contact with me shortly after you came back from Hell, to tell me of their project. I was hesitant at first considering all that was at stake, yet the scientist in me wanted to see it through. It was my curiosity which won in the end, as they offered for me to be apart of something that would be remembered forever... or so they thought. To tell you the truth I'm glad things didn't go their way. This 'Amon' figure proved to be someone I wouldn't want to work with."
Gandigan was speechless. The old man didn't even attempt to apologize for what he had been apart of. He wanted to kill him... but something inside stopped him. The old man had been called to act because of his knowledge, and that knowledge would be lost if Gandigan were to strike him down here. Balum knew that too, which is why he showed no fear in the face of death. He knew that Gandigan wouldn't go through with it.
"Come now, boy. Have you forgotten that I can read everything going on in that mind of yours? Let's put to rest this talk of death, shall we? I still need to patch you up. Even with your memories your mind is still wide open for everyone to see. You don't want people to take advantage of that, do you? It won't take long." Gandigan shoved him aside; that was probably the first time at all that Balum had looked shocked since the two had met.
"I will, but not from you. I don't trust someone like you poking around in my head. One day I may call upon you again, and I will expect you to answer. Until then... I hope not to see you for quite some time." Balum tried to speak again, but by then Gandigan had already left.
The underworld of the afterlife was one of many places that people liked to speculate was the origin of the Mazoku. Mazoku in the old tongue did mean Demon, and so the connection was obvious. Some think that Namekians found a way to mate with their kind, while others think that there was some sort of conquest or mutation. Still others yet believe that it had nothing to do with Demons all together, and instead believe that the environment or some other outside factor caused the changes to occur.
Gandigan didn't much care for any of that right now. Right now his task was rather simple: find and capture a Demon. He and his little gang had discovered that Demons possessed a unique ability which allowed them to travel to the afterlife without any need for a Guiding Candle or other such devices. It was something innate to them; something in their blood, and now Gandigan and his crew wanted to figure out how to control it themselves.
It wasn't just the Demons who had this ability; according to some reports the Kais could do it too, but they were a lot tougher to get their hands on. A lowly Demon should do the trick just as well as some grand asshole, and then their plans only got bigger. Once Gandigan got his hands on a Demon he'd take it back to his gang where they'd run it through every test they could, breaking down it's blood and guts to find the secret to this dimensional travel ability.
Then they'd have no problem travelling to and from the underworld whenever they wanted, which would allow them to start recruiting. The Mazoku were always fighting amongst themselves; trying to unite them was a bigger pain than anyone wanted to deal with. But Hell? There were millions of Demons who'd love to run wild in the living world, and Gandigan was happy to give them the opportunity. As long as they vaguely followed in the direction that he and his gang pointed in there shouldn't be any issues.
Once they had their army then the sky was the limit. First would be the Outer Plait; it'd be much easier bringing the Mazoku into the fold with an army at their backs. Then the rest of Namek would fall too. With home secured the option of intergalactic conquest was a real possibility. All of these memories flooding into the mind of Gandigan made him feel a little... uneasy. Some where similar to what he had planned now; was this history manifesting itself again?
Maybe he couldn't really ever escape his past. Maybe it'd always come back to him no matter where he ran or what he tried to do. But if that was the case, why try and fight it? Maybe what he needed to do was embrace it. If destiny and fate were real then he was stuck in their stream, carried by the force of nature down to where he belonged. He couldn't say the idea made him happy, but if that's the way the world worked then there wasn't anything he could do about it.
"Hey... what are you doing? Standing around? You've got a memory to complete. The potion... it won't last forever you know." That voice came back into his mind; the voice of Balum, the sage who brought him here. It was annoying to have that voice ring around in his head, but the reminder was good: the memory wouldn't last forever, and Gandigan wanted to see it through to the end. He knew how he had gotten to Hell the first time now, but how had Amon taken him?
His body began to move now, heading off like it knew where to go. For a while Gandigan moved in autopilot, allowing his legs to take him where they would. Along the way he saw all sorts of strange creatures which could have fit the bill: winged bats with fangs as long as his arms, or black hydras emerging from a sea of flames. They were all Demons fit enough to take them from one realm to another, but all would have been a huge hassle to try and capture.
Gandigan was after something else right now; something he had already caught sight of. His brisk walk had turned into a sprint as soon as he laid eyes on it. Off in the distance he could see it running too. It looked like a rodent of some kind, but larger than anything Gandigan had seen before. It was probably the size of his torso, which still made it smaller than most other Demons around here. It moved fast though, and Gandigan could feel his body struggling to keep up.
Before long the Namekian found himself out of the stony prison he had first landed in, and was now wadding through desert sands. Hell was strange like a dream was; he couldn't say when or where the transition had happened, yet in his mind it all made sense. His feet felt heavy trying to push through the sand, and he knew he needed to fly if he wanted to continue. He had been warned that more energy expenditure might make the candle run out faster, but he didn't have much of a choice now.
Pushing off into the air, Gandigan was now honing in on his target. It was right there in front of him; he just had to put his hands out and grab it! But that's when it all fell apart. As the Namekian attempt to capture his prey it slipped from his grasp, slinking into a giant black pyramid that Gandigan had somehow failed to notice earlier. A small opening presented an escape route, but Gandigan was much too big to fit. A part of him wanted to turn back and look for something else, but the curiosity of what was within proved too strong.
Stepping inside revealed hundreds, if not thousands of lesser Demons mining away, collecting the black rock the pyramid was made from. Where they were taking it he couldn't say, but he had definitely found a good batch to choose from. Every Demon here was beneath him in terms of power; all he had to do was pick which one to take... at least that's what would have happened, had he not been chosen first. The Namekian's presence was no longer a secret.
A burning sensation took over Gandigan's body, and no longer could he move. "What's... going on!?" Suddenly every Demon in sight looked up at Gandigan before scattering away, leaving just one in sight. This one stood out from all the rest; it must have even more powerful than the Namekian was. It stood tall, and in the shape of a Humanoid with large wings stretching from it's back. The creature took it's time walking up to Gandigan, savoring his struggle along the way.
By the time it finally reached him most of Gandigan's strength had been sapped away by some foul magic. "A mortal? In my domain? What is this occasion?" Gandigan wasn't sure if he was really expecting an answer, but by now he was too weak to talk anyway. Instead he was forced to look on as the Demon examined him. "Powerful enough to make an impact I think. I've been in need of a vessel for far too long now; I suppose you'll have to do."
Vessel... he didn't much like the sound of that. "I... have been barred from entering you realm directly. A hex placed on me by the ancient lord Thoth, a being more powerful than you can imagine. He has humiliated me by locking me here, but now I have devised a way to escape... in a sense. I need someone else's body to do so however. Someone powerful enough to survive the process, which I think you might just be. I hope you don't mind a new addition to your body."
The Demon placed his claw on top of the chest of Gandigan, pushing down until he pierced the skin. He would have screamed if he had the strength, but all he could do was stand and watch. He thought the beast might tear him in half, until Gandigan opened his eyes again. He found himself on the floor of the old castle. He had collapsed out of exhaustion, and the rest of his Mazoku allies were now standing around him, looking at him with wide eyes.
"I'm... back?" He looked up at the others. "Yes... you've been back for a few days now, but we couldn't wake you before." Gandigan couldn't remember anything after that last encounter. "Well... I suppose you want to hear about what happened, right?" The others remained silent. "Actually, there's no need. We've already been informed." Gandigan was confused by that. Informed? Before he could ask two Mazoku had grabbed him by the arms and had picked him up.
"What are you doing? Unhand me now! I command it!" An elderly Namekian entered the room, and spoke a language that Gandigan didn't recognize. Before long he could feel his eyes beginning to fall, even though he tried to fight it. Looking around the room last time he could see many crates, though what they contained he didn't know. "I wanted to wait until you awoke again, Gandigan. To tell you that I'm sorry about this personally."
Tiredness was taking over his body bit by bit, until he was barely hanging onto consciousness. "You did well to lead us in the beginning, but let's be real here: we've stagnated. New leadership is required if we want to go further, and I'm not just talking about myself. Your plan was decent enough, but unleashing a horde of Demons until the world? There was no guarantee that we could control them at all, which is why we need one of their own to lead them."
The doors flew open, and several more Mazoku stepped forward. They now had Gandigan hoisted over their shoulders. "This Demon who captured you? He calls himself Amon. He isn't able to get to this realm himself, but he can still send messages through. Apparently he went through your mind before your Candle gave out and figured out what you had planned to do. After that he sent us a message and told us of his own plans, and how we might have a role to play in them."
The Mazoku carried Gandigan laid him out onto a table in central hall, before returning to the room they had been in before. "I believe the future that Amon speaks off is a great deal more likely to succeed than that of yours. He already has an army of Mazoku under his control. All we need to is provide him with a vessel that he can use to operate in our world. Once it's grown strong enough he'll be able to open up a portal to bring them all through."
More Mazoku re-entered the room, and two of them carried along a box with them. "Now I could have volunteered myself for this role, but... well, I wanted to actually see this new world myself. I figured you were probably the better candidate, and Amon seemed to agree. Now I hope you don't take this personally; really we're just trying to achieve the same thing that you were, except we're going to go about it in a much better way."
Two of the Mazoku moved to either side of Gandigan, digging their claws into his body along the same wound that Amon had left behind. Upon a signal each one pulled, tearing open Gandigan's ribs and awakening him from whatever spell he had been put under. "AHHHHHHHHHHHH!" He tried to break free, but several other Mazoku jumped forward and grabbed hold of his limbs, forcing back into place. "Damnit! Hold him in place would you?"
The Mazoku held him down while another reached into a crate pulled out what Gandigan feared most: Amon's parasite. It was much smaller than it had been when it burst from out of his chest, but it was still sickening all the same. It writhed around in the Mazoku's hand, and let out a high pitched whine that made his ears burn. "Now put it into his chest, right on top of the heart." The Mazoku grunts did as they were ordered, placing the worm creature inside of Gandigan's body.
At the same time he saw elder Mazoku walking around the table, chanting from the same tongue from before. He couldn't make out what they were saying, but he could feel the effects of their words. His body's natural regeneration was being pushed into overdrive, forcing him to deal the wound the Mazoku had created. Looking down he could see the parasite feasting away at his own insides; it was a feral creature without any sort of self control.
A few moments later and it slowed, as though had somehow been tamed. Maybe it was the words of the elders, or maybe it Amon reaching out from the underworld. In any case it stopped the consumption of Gandigan and instead wrapped itself around his heart, before digging into his spinal cord from below. That was the last he saw of it before his chest was fully healed, locking the creature in it's place. The process was now nearing it's end.
His body began to move again, and soon his skin would shift as well. The pigmentation began to darken to what it was today as Amon's essence slowly began to fill into him. But Gandigan was far from defeated; now he really kicked things into another gear. He thrashed and shook himself until finally he was able to break free of the Mazoku's grasp, and ironically it seemed as though Amon's power may have been helping him here.
Gandigan forced himself off of the table and back to his feet. Most of the Mazoku were frozen in fear, including their leader. It was as though they weren't sure how to act: was this the will of Amon or his Namekian slave they were witnessing? Gandigan looked around at the faces surrounding him, spotting someone familiar looking across from the other side of the room. A face almost hidden beneath a cloak, as old as he had ever seen.
"What are you doing? Grab him you fools!" It was too late for that; Gandigan had already made his way past the first wave of Mazoku defenders and out of the castle doors. That was when the memory came to an end, with Gandigan waking up back in Balum's hut. He didn't need to see any more; he already knew how that story ended. He wasn't really sure how he was supposed to feel after all of that, as so much had changed from what he had assumed.
He had been apart of that gang? And it was his idea to go to Hell? He could hardly believe it, yet that was exactly what he saw. "A very interesting tale I think." Gandigan jumped up from out of his seat and grabbed a hold of Balum. "You! You were... there. I saw you there!" Balum didn't look surprised, or even scared. Gandigan could have destroyed him in an instant if he wanted to, and left this entire village in dust. Yet Balum didn't blink.
"Of course I was there. There is no sage older nor wiser than I am. Your friends made contact with me shortly after you came back from Hell, to tell me of their project. I was hesitant at first considering all that was at stake, yet the scientist in me wanted to see it through. It was my curiosity which won in the end, as they offered for me to be apart of something that would be remembered forever... or so they thought. To tell you the truth I'm glad things didn't go their way. This 'Amon' figure proved to be someone I wouldn't want to work with."
Gandigan was speechless. The old man didn't even attempt to apologize for what he had been apart of. He wanted to kill him... but something inside stopped him. The old man had been called to act because of his knowledge, and that knowledge would be lost if Gandigan were to strike him down here. Balum knew that too, which is why he showed no fear in the face of death. He knew that Gandigan wouldn't go through with it.
"Come now, boy. Have you forgotten that I can read everything going on in that mind of yours? Let's put to rest this talk of death, shall we? I still need to patch you up. Even with your memories your mind is still wide open for everyone to see. You don't want people to take advantage of that, do you? It won't take long." Gandigan shoved him aside; that was probably the first time at all that Balum had looked shocked since the two had met.
"I will, but not from you. I don't trust someone like you poking around in my head. One day I may call upon you again, and I will expect you to answer. Until then... I hope not to see you for quite some time." Balum tried to speak again, but by then Gandigan had already left.
