He stretched slowly, dust falling from his robes. "A disturbance? Can you be any more vague?"
"I can try, my liege."
He stretched out a hand and fire roared out in a blast that rolled along the walls and floor for a moment.
"Thank you, my liege. Floor was a bit chilly."
"Mfghhhhhrrrr," interjected a guardsman.
"You, your jawbone is on the floor. Get it back in place before you try anything else." The Lord of the Domain looked around. "Oh, gag. The dust is everywhere. What happened to the maids?"
"They're dead, my liege."
"So are we, so that's no bloody excuse at all," pointed out the Lord.
"Great liege, we were cursed. The maids and the stablehands, the gardeners and the craftsmen, they are but ghosts. They have no physical form, unlike you and I."
"True, I'd expect them to be able to do something about this mess though," admitted the Lord. "Jeeves, how long has it been?"
"Since the Curse was laid upon us my liege - I'll have to check but at least two thousand years. And my name isn't 'Jeeves' you know."
"No, no. Since anything happened and we all just about died a second time from sheer boredom, going into a state similar to sleep?"
"Ah. About two hundred years I'd think. I can check the position of the stars later."
"Two hundred years," said the skeletal figure. "Two hundred years without so much as a sparrow crossing our borders? Two hundred years where the land lies dead and nothing will grow? Two hundred years where nothing that lives has stirred itself?"
"Well plus the hundred and fifty before that, yes, that's why we all went dormant from the boredom."
"True," said the Lord of the Domain, waving the point off. "You. You just dropped your jawbone again, didn't you?"
"Sowwy."
The lich sighed, a particularly bored sigh that practically reeked of ennui. He'd practiced it well enough after all. "Find out what has come within my Domain."
"I'll dispatch some spectral knights to deal with it, my liege."
"Are you effing high? And if so - HOW?" The lich held up a fistful of flame but dismissed it a moment later. "OBSERVE. Don't go slaughtering them out of hand, ye daft idjit. Have your brains dried completely out, Peeves?"
"My name's not 'Peeves' sir," said the seneschal, opening a part of his skull and letting dust pour out. "And it looks like they have, sir."
"I see. So they have." The lich began brushing the dust and cobwebs off. "Who knows? They might even have someone who can break this damn Curse laid upon my kingdom. Have to consider that, Sigmund."
"Oh," said the seneschal, making a gesture of understanding. "Though my name isn't 'Sigmund' either, sir. Only been working for you for a bit over a thousand years. And then, if they can't remove the Curse, what?"
"And if not we'll find entertaining ways of killing them and recruiting them into the kingdom where they can at least be new faces around here. Until the faces fall off of course."
"Did you guys just get a VERY bad feeling? As if something with a lot of little cold feet just ran down your back?"
Naruto looked back there and plucked the thing off. "You were right, Sakura. Some kinda centipede with a skull shape on the back. Neat, huh?"
"No." Sakura shuddered at the squirming thing. "Not neat at all."
Sasuke continued to look above them. "Skeletal bats."
"How do they fly anyway?" asked Sakura, looking herself at the white shapes flitting overhead. "There's just bones. No skin surface to provide lift, no muscles to provide power."
"Chakra?" tried Naruto, tossing the centipede to the side.
"Thank you, that was singularly unhelpful," said Sakura.
"Quiet," said Sasuke. "Something's coming."
Read the comments on this episode
(Posted Sun, 10 Aug 2014 16:24)
Questions? Problems? Suggestions?
Send a mail to addventure@bast-enterprises.de
or use the contact form.
らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
All other series and their characters are © by their respective creators or owners. No claims of ownership of these characters are implied by the authors of this Addventure, or should be inferred.
The Anime Addventure is a non-profit site.