Shadows of Elysium: The Laughing King

Chapter 21: The Sandstone Lady

It was a grueling job hauling wagon after wagon of corpses to the edge of the sea and items scavenged from the once living to the bar. They both helped, where possible, with a fair share of the hauling, but occasionally came across an Elysium abomination that was too interesting for Crow to not record details about. Jasper didn't complain. It seemed like a noble enough cause. One that could come in handy later.

Besides, corpse moving was a taxing job in every way; it would be wrong to fault anyone for taking a break. And a break to examine corpses didn't seem like much of a break anyway.

Jasper picked up another mutant with a blood dried neck and a moldy collar. Their breath was always foul, but this one had a weird arrangement of teeth to boot (probably his mutation, but maybe they had just been caved in). He stacked sideways on the wagon next to a man with four arms and a shark-toothed woman who was still clutching a spear in a forward position, ready to stab.

The wagon was overflowing with nearly forty men and women and three large abominations not worth description (for the sake of sanity). It may be worth mentioning the cluster of hairy spider legs dangling low enough to put tracks in the sand.

So Jasper wheeled it to the edge of the great gulf, far from the village and the sleeping wolf in the water. He reasoned that they would have to travel that coast soon to get to where Crow was going, so teasing the sea monsters out into shallow water didn't seem smart. Plus, it just felt right to release them to the ocean.

Dozens of sea creatures rose to the top to feast. They went to town on the bodies as they had since the first wagon, but giant serpents and fish alike parted way for the true predator of the gulf. At first, it seemed to be another group of serpents. Smooth skinned monsters the color of dripping tar, slithering up from the ocean. Miles of the creatures snaked their way past the other leviathans.

Their first prey was the second biggest thing in the water. A draconic serpent that had made too much noise chomping into the spider-like atrocity Jasper had just thrown in.

The inky serpents rose into the sky. The shadows stretched beyond the village and blotted out the sun. It was clear now that they were one creature. A sinular mass of tentacles with only a mouth for a body. The tentacles made short work of shoveling food back into the pit of teeth resting at the far end of the gulf, miles away. A shiver went through Jasper's body, and the chill stayed trapped in his armor. Monsters so insanely large that the only reason they didn't eat you was because you were insignificant, were a dime a dozen.

It may not have been the burial they deserved, or even the one he would have liked to give, but it made the streets a bit more peaceful for the living.

Another trip. Another load of bodies. Jasper's blade sank into the soft eye of a dead man, just to be sure. Then he picked the corpse up by an arm and a leg, lifting it over his shoulder and tossing it into the wagon.

Limbs of the dead clatter against the side of the wooden cart as the wheels rattle across loose shells and sand. In the distance, there was one shell as tall as Jasper's cart, with swirl patterns etched into its back by the wind and waves.

Tendrils and crab legs alike spawned from the depths of the shell and pulled the creature further up the beach, away from the tainted water.

"Every year, they travel further north, closer to the True Wastelands, but away from the water."

Jasper turned to the female voice, expecting to see Vanessa Crow. It seemed like something that would concern her after all. Instead, he saw another woman similarly afflicted by Elysium. Two lines of tattoo text hover over her chest like an X. Over her shoulder at the neck and back up under her armpits. She made no attempt to hide them like Crow did, but then most didn't. Also, unlike Crow, the effects were changing this woman already. Both of her arms were made of a glassy sandstone, nearly invisible against the sand of the beach.