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I started to head down the center of the
road as I took out the map out of my pocket. After looking at it for a few
minutes I realized that Concord Manor was on the other side of the city but
there were only a dozen roads that were in the city, which made it rather small.
As the steps got further into the center I realized that the buildings got
larger like they were before previously but as things became grander, the focus
of a now apocalyptic wasteland became apparent. Abandoned cars left with there
doors open littered the road and bones of many people littered the streets like
a silver lining to a short story—it only made things worse.
Closer I got to the center, the more I
realized that the fog was letting up letting me to see the tops of buildings I
looked up and smoke barreled from out of the windows which were on fire. No craters
of a nuclear bomb or artillery strikes were on either the roads or the
buildings but it became apparent that something big toppled the buildings instead
of an all out war in front of me blocking my passage to the center of the city.
It felt like I was walking to the exact direction that danger was.
Crawling under the rubble of one of the
buildings I realized that now I was in the center. Large buildings with long
staircases and marble pillars circled a large courtyard that I was now
entering. In the center of this courtyard was another black pillar that brought
stress through my veins all over again. It was as if it was the same one as
before, like it was following me. Large thick tiles circled the pillar out
several feet till it reached a series of columns that were equidistant apart
from each other circled the central pillar.
I looked out in the distance to see what
resembled the capital building that didn't differ to far from the look of an
amphitheater in Athens but a large circular dome sat in the center as the roof.
This circular roof had sections that were blown clean off as black smoke rose
from the holes that were inside the building. The winds grew to be strong in
this center area as I heard the whistle of large gusts in the distance but I
stayed as close as I could to the buildings outside the center. If this was
similar the thing that created The Wretched that I met before then it would be
best for me to steer clear of whatever that pillar was.
I looked down to a nearby street sign
that was toppled over on the ground. Wiping off the dust off the sign it read
'Oak'. I looked down to my map again to see that Willow was only a few streets
to my right as I continued to head that direction around the courtyard. A
rumbling from underneath me sounded to create a deep rushing sound as I began
to walk through puddles of water. As I got a better view of the courtyard at
another angle I saw that several people lay just outside the columns that were
surrounding the pillar. Pools of red filled the spaces between the tiles that
the bodies lied on and traveled down an apparent decline towards where I was
heading. Knives were near there hands and I could only guess that a mass
suicide took place in front of the central pillar—something to appease there
god?
The pools of water I was walking in
gradually turned reddish till it was all I could see below me. I passed another
street and as I looked down it I saw the incoming fog that was rolling down the
streets as if a damn just broke open forcing water to push throughout the city—I
hastened up my pace. More rumbling sounded from underneath me but this time I
knew it wasn't a busted water main as it shook the ground beneath my feet. I looked
further to my right and the sign that read 'Willow' was only several
yards away from me.
I pushed myself away from the buildings
that were behind me and rushed directly to the street to where I was headed.
Looking quickly to my right to another passing street in which the fog was
barreling down and then I looked to my left to see the pillar start to light up
and raise its black corrupting vines that infected the air it touched like ivy
growing up a wall. I turned on Willow to begin heading down the road but soon
as my eyes were back in front of me I hit a wall of fog which nearly put me to
my feet not by blocking the road but the damp smell off blood and rust got me
coughing out my lungs.
As I attempted to catch my breath I
looked behind me again to see the pillar glowing under the currently present
thin fog but then I saw it. It was as if it was lying down inside the capital
building but it was large. Arms and then a face reached out of one of the
largest holes that were in the roof. Black. That's all it was. Black arms,
black face, black eyes, its as if it was sucking out the rays of the sun
creating a more dull appearance of the sun then it screamed. Like before it was
as if a call of a ferocious beast but something about it was remarkably human,
it sounded as if it was in pain. In distress or not I scrambled back up to an
upright pose and backed away down Willow hoping that I would find Concord Manor
before that beast found me.
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