Entbehrung: The Wandering City of Erawan

Chapter 1

Verlone Swamp was a hot and humid mess brimming with bodies. Not the usual crowd that bob up and down on the murky water's surface as an all you can eat feast for the ever-hungry wildlife. No, these particular bodies knew what they were doing. They knew where they were going. Once they crossed the blue vine-laced entrance to the clearing, a blessed wash of pink sunlight led them through the long-abandoned ruins.

Massive fallen statues watched in broken silence, their severed heads lost under the years of growing foliage, degraded into hills housing roots of wires and tubes. Their limbs were reduced to rusted walkways, keeping these enslaving bastards above the deadly waters. Slavers, they came in all shapes and sizes. Didn't matter what kind of mutation they had as long as they were good with their hands, quick on their feet, strong in their stomachs, and messed in the head. The mixed bag of barbarians they sent this time were from lands farther than reasonable.

Kobolds mixed with knockers. Bogeys mixed with brownies. Trows mixed with tengus. It was like someone spun a compass and all four corners of the world swirled into this very swamp. The only thing similar in their melting pot of masks and scales were their red jewel armbands, the gems seared into their skin to never be taken off. Once a slaver, always a slaver.

Not a human in sight. Maybe they knew something these fae didn't. Maybe the slave masters didn't want to risk the more rare human on such a small prize. They were too clean to waste, too pure. Even the enslaved ones cost more, over double in most kingdoms.

This wave of mutated schmucks kept themselves in the open; kept their eyes on the branches and vines draped above them.

If anyone or anything was hiding in the trees, their gargoyle scouts would see them, mounted by starved klabauters of the eastern breed. Those big throat slimeballs, they'd do anything for shrekles. Their bulging eyes made them great for reconnaissance and bad at everything else. Every kekkarian shared that trait, as crooked as their deformed legs. Klabauters were the lighter sort - easier to buy with less coin and didn't jump off at the slightest shine of water like their ever-thirsty Oasisilian sisters.

Crystal shavings twinkled behind them like gentle stardust, their wings shaking off their encroaching sleep. They're pushing these poor creatures past their limit, keeping them up past their bedtime. Whoever they wanted in these ruins was worth the cost of such losses. Worth the time it took to train, tame, and arm up these bags of angry meat they called warriors. The creatures of the swamp cast out the weak, a natural selector that thinned their numbers and trimmed the useless fat.

There were more this time around, with forged blades and smelted armor no less.

They planned to throw bodies at the problem; like that'll solve everything. Wear it down with numbers, death by a thousand needles. Starve it out like a stronghold siege. Joke's on them, there's plenty to eat in these parts. Juicy spiders, endless amounts of meaty centipede legs, the lower levels full of assorted flavorful mushrooms.

The ones that didn't bite back were preferred. That included the mushrooms.

The only problem was the freshwater, or that is, the lack of. There's something black lurking in it, a cloud of what smelled like wet fire and tasted like a handful of rusty razors. An unknown type of nektar from the forgotten metal veins pumping from the abandoned mechanical heart of the place. Seeping from stained tubes hidden behind the walls, channeling who-knows-what to nobody cares. There was no need to drink it with how many creatures filtered it and no need to waste headspace thinking about it. Avoid their acidic digestive tracts, their toxic thorns, and their venom/poison glands... and it's safe.

A gargoyle perched on the sloped roof of the structure, taking no more of it. They weren't made for long trips to oversized mud puddles in the middle of nowhere. They were made for patrols, sticking to patterns, and with plenty of spots to rest between flights. If they had blood, the torn muscles in their wings would be bleeding by now. Steam hissed from between its thirsty fangs and flapped its floppy ears, the nektar in its belly getting dangerously hot.