STS Chapter 100: Byrgenwerthy Pals (Patreon)

"We are just two pals~ chilling in an adventure~ five feet apart cus he is a spider~" I was in a good mood, truly. I finally found someone at least debatably sane in this god forsake...? No, its far from forsaken. The opposite really.

God infested, yes that's the word.

Currently, Spatches was following behind me as we both headed to Brygenworth or whatever that place was called. Apparently, the place was somewhere like a college made up by scholar people above some sacred Eldrich god burial grounds or whatever. And the place had been declared a no-go zone by the healing church guys.

Honestly, I couldn't tell you how much of that information came from the voices in my head and how much of it came from the spider with a human head skittering behind me.

I wanted to go and bust down to where Patches had told me to go when he thought I was some witless schmuck ready to fall into his next nefarious scheme but he informed me that what I was intending to try and throw my hands with was an Amygdala.

Not that I am scared but there is an order to these things. I can't just waltz up to an outer god's door, kick it down and give it the old deadman treatment when there are other bosses I haven't defeated yet.

Yharman may be a filthy, bloodsoaked, insane asylum with mind-numbing architecture but it was a shithole with loot.

Besides you can never be too prepared to fight an eldrich monstrosity.

As we went past the place where I fought the losers of Yharnam. A weird-looking insect guy suddenly jumped me. Of course, as a Lordran native, I wasn't surprised about getting jumped, after all, that was 90% of the action in downtown Lordran.

No, what surprised me was just how ugly these guys were. It's like someone fused a fly, a spider and a human together and this thing was the worst possible outcome.

*Bang!*

Out of reflex my left hand shot up and blasted the blasted creature right in the many-eyed dome with my mystical ability called the sawed-off shotgun. Predictably such an attack scattered its bulbous head to the wall.

"Spatches, what the hell was that?" I asked my now my guide in this world as he shot an offended expression at me.

"How would I know? Are you asking this because we are both insects? Because if so that is just plain rude."

"Not an insect."

"What?" Spatches gave me a Spatches-ish confused look as I elaborated further to clear up my dear 8-legged friend's confusion.

"Spiders aren't insects they are arachnids, while they have surface similarities their behaviours and biology are enough to make them two distinct categories. I asked you this because both of you are slimy and have no hair." Spatches looked at me in bewilderment before looking down and at me again.

"...Fair enough I guess. Though I should mention I don't really know these parts too well. Never cared to venture far with all these beasts lying around. While they might not attack me I don't want to risk finding one that does."

I nodded and we continued forth, finding more of the weird monstrosities. Unfortunately for them, all they were good for was practising my aim which was already impeccable. And we were in front of the mansion-like place, I don't know why there are so many fly people here but I applied the most crucial rule in surviving Britain here.

Don't ask questions.

That's how you increase your insight. And I don't want more voices whispering such abhorrent things into my ear such as.

'How did the first person who drank milk discover it? What were they trying to do to that cow?'

'Your existence is a cursed abomination and love is but a foreign dream to you.'

'Most animals can't scratch themselves when they are itchy unlike humans.'

Thankfully, I have long become a master at compartmentalization so those voices do not hold much power over me. Is it healthy?

Definitely not.

But neither is getting the eldrich secrets of the universe getting whispered into your ear 24/7. Besides, look around you, this is Yharnam. If you looking for anything even remotely you are at the wrong place.

The only hiccup we experienced in the outside of the fancy-looking abode was when we encountered a giant grotesque centipede creature that could somehow shoot fireballs.

Only in Britain.

After that, we entered the mansion-like place by the power vested in me by my leg to break down doors with brutal finesse. Nothing impressive was on the first floor, a lot of books I stole a few weird-looking bugs trapped in a chest for some reason. And a cage with books inside.

Don't ask me why. Don't ask questions.

On the upper floor, however...

Patches skittered away from the flames as I backed off from the crazy lady using a flame thrower against me.

"Hey lady, I don't want to fight you." I tried selecting the mercy option for this encounter but unfortunately, the reason why she put her flamethrower down wasn't to give me a firm yet friendly handshake to establish friendly relations but instead to create a fucking portal that shot tentacles at me.

That ranks top 100 of the weirdest/fucked up things I have seen.

Of course, I got serious and pulled out the chaos blade before dicing those bastards up before I got victimized by the tentacles like an anime girl.

I have an intense distrust of tentacles. They signify either eldrich bullshit or nsfw being committed upon you. And I prefer to stay untentacled thank you very much.

After that close encounter, I got serious and crushed her neck like it was an empty soda can via telekinesis.

Man, this thing is brutal when you combine it with enemies unable to resist esoteric bullshit and precise knowledge of the human anatomy.

Fights aren't really fair when one party has the ability to turn your spine into a slinky at will.

Well, looting her body I found some blue elixir. And I was bored.

And it looked tasty.

I mean it looks like that one sports drink from back on earth but glowing! I thought it might taste like blueberries and I really missed the taste of anything really.

So against Patches' warnings, I took a chug of the blue elixir and faced the biggest disappointment of my life.

It didn't taste like blueberry. It tasted like licking a metal pole on a winter night.

God is dead.

That is not a statement. That is a threat.

With my rage meter slowly being filled I started climbing up the building, finding a key to a Lunarium or whatever there. And as someone with free will who refuses to play by the whims of the gods I threw the key away, I was already born with a key that opens all doors, it was called violence.

I was pretty fucking stoked to see a treasure chest at the top of the tower, bringing me back to my Lordran days of finding good loot but unfortunately, all I found was some stupid fucking bug moult.

I hate the goddam scholars of London. At least the nerds in Lordran actually created cool shit like magic arrows and weird crossbows. What do these guys do? They freak out and worship some mildly weird-looking bugs before doing the most inhume experiments and building shitty architecture.

The moment I find the head scholar of this place I am giving him a piece of my mind.

Depending on the occasion, I refer to my shotgun and fists as my mind.

Having reached an anger level of cartoon smoke billowing out of my ears I retreived Spatches and found the locked door the key led to.

"Spatches, tell me, how does one open a locked door?"

Spatches sighed in resignation, already aware that I was going to blow his little arachnid brain out of his immaculately hairless done with my amazing facts and logic.

"Well, I usually just pick locks. You know with everything being locked by different keys I taught myself to pick locks instead of searching for the keys. I can't really do that anymore for obvious reasons. Why do you ask?"

*Tsk* *Tsk* I shook my head. Such a narrow mind for such a wide forehead.

"You see Patches, locks are keys are simply restrictions imposed onto us by gods and beings beyond our perception. They are tools they use to control us, guide our actions like we are puppets bound by strings." This made Spatches give me a really worried expression.

"My lord, I genuinely can't tell whether this is yet another delusion of yours or whether what you are speaking is actual fact considering the fact that you are still the god of almost everything in Lordran even though you seem to forget you are."

"Believe me patches, don't let Big Divinity shackle with the concept of lock and key. It is when you submit to their bindings that you let yourself become a puppet. THIS! Is the true way to get through a door." I reared my leg back as I heard Patches whisper 'Delusion it is then.' before I shattered the door into a thousand pieces with my binding breaker 9000 also named the leg.

Past the door was an unusually beautiful view of the ominous moon hanging above the vast body of water giving off a sense of mystery. Honestly, if it weren't for the old man in a rocking chair and my instincts screaming at me about how sus this whole place I would almost enjoy the view.

"Patches, I think it would be for the best for you to stay, I have some eldrich business to settle with this place." Patches did not need much convincing to stay away from the action as he nodded readily and skittered away as I advanced.

I approached the "old man" or what remained of him anyway. The thing before me was basically a carcass infested with Eldrich mushrooms of whatever that somehow still clung to life to some degree.

Honestly, I think I would be doing a favour for the old bloke by putting him out of his misery. I tried to do it quickly by instantly splattering his skull with my fist. He also dropped the {Eye} which increased my perception.

Now that everything was over my instincts told me to jump into the water to face my next enemy.

Well, no use avoiding the issue now.

Without hesitation I took the plunge.

A/N: That's right, Soulsborne isn't dead yet. Shocking, I know. Due to the lack of demand, I may write this less frequently than NGJ but I still feel a duty to write it and at least finish the bloodborne portion so you can at least be assured of that.

On another note what did you think of the chapter? I would love to know.