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𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐓𝐇𝐈𝐑𝐓𝐘-𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑 : 𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐏𝐇𝐄𝐂𝐘 𝐎𝐅 𝐃𝐄𝐌𝐈𝐒𝐄
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To get to Rothenberg, it is simple in hindsight.
To begin your journey, travel to the demon world and trek past the opulent castle, buzzing shops, and allusive buildings through eerie alleyways the sun turns a blind eye towards. Take caution in the shadows. The flame-like vapors will rise; serpentine tendrils grabbing onto you and clamping down, all sense of life and joy parasitically leeched out from within.
The souring atmosphere does little to ease the dread exuding from the depths of bone marrow, nor does the cackling cries of the swirling murder of crows in the dim skies above. It is only when your shoes pad through the sticky, swamp-like ground and you breathe in dark thick air that makes you want to claw at your throat for oxygen do you know that you're at the right place.
There are no winding flowers to bring eternal vows, fragrant perfumes, or coiffure embellishments. Like a barren Lethe, all that's left is fruitless land with a fruitless augury for its inhabitants.
This is an abyss in the land of the damned. A penumbra tucked away quietly in the corner of Hades, cast with an eclipse that even vantablack can not escape. Here, diamonds turn to charcoal, bohemian wine turns hemlock-ridden, and most importantly.... the weak turn to ashes.
To get to Rothenberg, it is simple.
To survive Rothenberg is another story.
To survive, one must have to use all of their tricks, outwit the deadliest of desires, and acquiesce with a crestfallen longing for more.
More food to satiate their palpable hunger; greedy hands finding nourishment in the putrescent carcasses of dead vermin. More housing for the overcrowded slums all packed tightly like sardines in a can. More clothes to cover their skeleton frail bodies; the smallest fall leading to a deafening snap brittle bones can no longer heal. And more serenity to see the rise of a new day.
But they only have to bear with these treacherous conditions for just a little longer. For their glorious Ghoul King will lead them to paradise soon. He'll change the name of the ghouls from muttered curses underneath rotten breath to a triumphant litany shouted from rooftops.
At least that's what the Ghoul King says.
That's what Kino says.
But Kino's word is as trustworthy as his temper. That is, not trustworthy at all.
And when two options diverged in decaying wood, instead of traveling down the simple path to Rothenberg, he decided on the harsh, unbeaten one and proceeded to wake me up promptly at five AM and teleport us straight into his castle of bones leaving me with a severe bout of vertigo upon arrival.
