I think you are far from the only reader. Note how many views there are compared to the number of posts in the thread. You and odd chick are the only ones who have posted regularly since I revived this story.
Here's another chapter. But, since I'm leaving for college orientation this afternoon and won't be back for three days, you'll have to wait for the final chapter until Tuesday night. Ha ha.
Chapter 43
Three mudokons had tumbled out of the air ... not bird portals as I would have expected. They were identical. Each had bright blue skin, long red feathers tied together and reaching down their backs, roughly-woven loincloths, intricately designed tattoos... everything was the same.
I was instantly paranoid. Given my course of luck, these guys would soon turn on me and challenge me to a death match. If these three guys could just pop out into the ending of this big sacred quest, then what chance of defending myself did I have?
“What do you want?” I murmured, not quite looking at them.
The mudokon on the left answered: “We’re here to congratulate you!”
The one in the middle picked up here. “We were starting to think no one would come again!”
The one on the right finished. “But here you are!”
I shook my head, trying to clear my thoughts. Congratulate me? So ... did that mean they were waiting for my arrival? Did they live in this terrible place?
“What are you doing here?” I cried. “Waiting to greet and laugh at whatever miserable mudokon ruins himself to come here?”
The mudokons took on identical looks of distress.
“Of course not!”
“Don’t be silly!”
“Wouldn’t dream of it!”
I rubbed my forehead. These guys ... I was liking them less and less. “So what’s your story?”
“We’ve been here for centuries...”
“ ... since the totems were erected ...”
“ ... and stood to reward whoever had the courage to come all this way.”
I stared. Not impressed.
“It’s been decades since anyone made an attempt ...
“ ... no one seems to have the balls anymore ...”
“ ... so we’re gonna give you something cool!”
The three muds began the chant in a surprising three-part harmony. It was beautiful, and I smiled in spite of myself. I had forgotten how angry I had been up until now, and how much I despised these mudokons.
They stopped chanting and raised their arms above their heads in unison, and the backs of my hands erupted in a searing pain. I bit back a scream, and struggled it down.
The pain subsided, but my hands remained sore. I examined them ... and found two tattoos. One resembled a crude scrab, and the other, a roughly drawn paramite. These guys were no artists.
“Okay,” I coughed. “You’ve just scarred my hands. What good is that going to do me?”
The muds smiled. It was getting unnerving, seeing them perform all their actions in unison.
“Are you familiar with the story of Abe?”
“Do you know about the scars on his hands?”
“Do you know what having these scars means?”
I shrugged. I had a vague idea ... “The scars had something to do with Abe’s Shrykull ability,” I ventured.
They looked eagerly back at me, as if waiting for me to go on.
“But I didn’t complete the trials he did, so I have these scars for another reason.”
The mudokons looked ready to cheer their triumph, but I guess they realized what I had said. The three of them finally broke formation, and shared very non-identical looks of puzzlement and confusion.
“No, see ... these tattoos are the same ...”
“A mudokon with these tattoos is a Big Kahonee ...”
“Why doesn’t he get it?”
Now I knew they were yanking my chain. They wanted me to believe I could perform a Shrykull morph because they wanted me to feel like a fool when I tried to become one. Then, of course, they would laugh at my idiocy ...
“Look here!” I shouted at them, breaking up their chatter, and unleashing a mighty sneeze at the same time. Great. On top of these clowns insulting me, the cold trek on the bridge probably left me with the flu. “I’ll show you I can’t become a Shrykull!”
They shrugged and smiled. There it was -- proof that they were planning a crude joke at my expense.
I began to chant, and did so for a full minute without any change.
I stopped and glared at them, feeling an odd combination of proud triumph and crushed defeat. I had almost hoped, for just a glimmering moment, that I would prove myself wrong. But alas ...
“Dante, dude, you need to know something ...”
“The Shrykull can only be activated by liberating mudokons ...”
“The spiritual energy formed by cleansing the body and souls of freed mudokons ...”
They finished in unison, making me cringe: “ ... is channeled back into the body of the one who saved them!”
I gave them a suspicious look. I didn’t want to believe them, but the seed of hope had been planted.
“Prove it to me.”
They shrugged and crouched to the ground, produced rags, and began scrubbing the dirt.
What the ...? Then I heard a sudden fluttering sound to my left, and saw a small flock of birds flying in a peculiar formation: they were flying in such a way as to form a vertical ring of birds.
A bird portal ... I see.
I turned back to the mudokons, ready to at least try. “All o’ ya!”
The mudokons stood up.
“Hello.”
“Hi!”
“Hullo.”
I rolled my eyes. “Follow me.”
Three “Okay”s.
I led them nearer to the bird portal and began to chant. At first nothing happened, and then ... the birds drifted quickly towards each other. At the point where they met, a bright white-blue light flashed out, and I saw an opening in space. It resembled Oblim, the village I had brought color to near the beginning of my quest. The mudokons cheered and ran towards the opening, leaping happily into it.
As they leapt through, I felt ... something. Like my skin was crawling, but not with fear or disgust. It felt ... empowering. Like a mere movement of my hand could rend a mountain range flat.
But the feeling passed, and there I was, alone in the darkness at the end of my quest, with only the company of the mudokon totem.
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