Summer, 1392

“Is the platform ready?” Noran asked, bearing a torch.

“Yes sir. We’ve connected enough chains to the pulley system to go down 1000 feet. We can link more if we need to go lower.”

Majordomo Noran had assembled ten Zealots and four Crusaders with him to venture into the bottomless pit. As soon as he stepped onto the wooden platform, four zealots began driving the pulleys, gradually lowering the task force into the pit. 100 feet. 200 feet. Darkness quickly enveloped the small party. 300 feet. 400 feet. Still the platform plunged downwards. Torch in hand, Noran silently watched the cliff face zoom up from below him. 500 feet. 600 feet. 700 feet. The other members of the party sat tensely as the platform worked its way down. 800 feet. 900 feet. The Zealots linked another length of chain.

1000 feet. 1500 feet. 2000 feet. Another chain. 2500 feet.

And then suddenly Noran saw shapes appear.

Bones. Bones. Bones. The remains of hundreds, if not thousands of the Miscabbard’s victims lay piled up in mounds all around them, the freshly sacrificed from the day before adding another rotting layer to them. It was unclear how far the remains had piled up, how deep they went but for the piles that continued downwards. The platform gently stopped directly atop one of the mounds.

Noran frowned. “I guess we start looking.”

Torchlight danced around as the Miscabbards got off and searched for the remains of a dragon. Fresh blood and viscera intermingled with dusty remains, liable to crumble apart at the slightest brush. Nothing looked even remotely approaching the body of a creature that large a size. One would think a giant lizard would be easy to find.

“Do you believe in the Sigelwara?” One of his Crusaders suddenly asked.

Noran frowned. Some of the Miscabbards believed that there was a massive demon living deep in the pit that fed off of the dead creatures the cult had dumped there. Some thought that the Lord of the Earth had defeated the Sigelwara and cast him further into the darkness, others that the pit itself connected to another realm-the Void-ruled by this Sigelwara, the Lord of the Void. Noran had dismissed the rumors for decades, but honestly he didn’t know. He wasn’t even sure that the Lord of the Sky knew what was down here, and whether there was a Sigelwara at all. He wanted to say that the Sigelwara was a hoax, a phantom of people who had spent to long in Kavi without going out, but here he was, taking orders going down into a bottomless pit on the orders of a dragon slave turned demon lord. The majordomo gripped his executioner’s scythe tightly.

“Let us just find the female dragon, and we can cut off its head and get out of this place.”

The mounds of bones were dangerous, unstable and slippery like cinders atop a volcano. Within only a few minutes, one of the Crusaders slipped on a loose pile of bones and the whole thing collapsed, sending him screaming with a cascading clatter of bones deeper into the pit. A Zealot was caught by the cascade, and when the shifting bones finally stopped he was on the edge of the cliff.

“Help me.” The Zealot gasped.

“Leave him. It’s too dangerous to try to get him out.” Noran replied.

“What-” the Zealot gasped, his last words as an arrow from another cultist embedded in an eye, sending him tumbling downward.

“No one will be rescued if they fall.” Noran ordered. Fear was in everyone’s eyes, but they nodded. No one would be sticking their neck out in this unstable surface.

The cultists looked for an hour. They eventually found one of the horses of the Crusaders who charged into the pit, still clad in plate armor. A few minutes later, they found one of the other Crusaders who fell in. The fallen cultists’ entire body had broken upon impact.

Noran wiped his brow. It had been an excruciating hour, carefully testing each step before scanning around by the tiny glow of a torch flame. This was the first sign of the recent battle. “Maybe that means we’re close.”

“Hopefully. This place is a goddamn nightmare.” A Crusader mumbled.

“What is that?” Suddenly, one of the Zealots pointed to a dull glow appearing below it. All thirteen Miscabbards stopped and stared. The glow slowly became larger, and larger, and then suddenly resolved into a pair of eyes. And then everything exploded in a blinding glow of white. With a scream, the pointing Zealot vaporized into the light.

“The Sigelwara!” One of the Crusaders screamed, immediately running back towards the platform. Noran didn’t argue. Immediately the rest followed, stepping over the clanking, rickety and unstable paths back to the platform with the reckless abandon of fear. Soon enough, whether through a misstep or a deliberate action from the demon, the piled bones crumbled away behind the cultists. The collapse quickly caught up to Noran’s party, pulling down one cultist, then another, then another again like wolves snatching up so many deer in a pack hunt.

Noran ran faster.

Just as the ground gave way below him, the Majordomo jumped onto the platform, landing with a thud as the bulk of his party fell screaming to their deaths. The four survivors listened to the screams echo across the walls and gradually die away.

Noran and the other three stared at each other.

Then the glow lit up again, nearby.

Directly facing them.

Immediately everyone ran to the pulleys.

“Up! Up! Up! Up!” Noran cried. The platform rose slowly with each clinking pull from the survivors. 2500 feet.

Noran’s crew were pulling as fast as they can, the chain links almost flying as it wound around the wheel and spat out the other end.

2000 feet.

The eyes appeared, and focused on the platform rising above it.

And then it moved.

The eyes and the demonic glow seemed to shoot up like a volcanic eruption.

1500 feet.

In spite of himself, Noran fell to the floor of the rising platform, looking over the side and staring in awe and fear at the thing pursuing them. It was rapidly gaining ground. Above the white glow of the surface beckoned.

1000 feet.

The Sigelwara was approaching. Could they make it to the top? The chains were positively smothering. Hands were burning and bleeding from the friction. The members needed all the energy and help they could to pull themselves away. Still Noran stared, hypnotized at the figure coming up.

900 feet.

Those eyes were gaining and it had a massive body. It was climbing after them.

“All hail the Lord of the Sky.” One of the Zealots prayed aloud.

800 feet.

The hole above was getting larger.

But so were the eyes and glow below.

The thing was a mass of muscle, its dark shape rapidly clambering over the rocks and crevices of the sides of the pit.

700 feet.

Noran saw that the glow was coming from its open mouth, a mouth lined with gleaming teeth. And those piercing eyes, soulless, reflective.

It was coming after them.

It was coming after him.

600 feet.

Noran stopped and flopped with his back to the wheel. The eyes below were increasing faster than the hole above was increasing.

They were not going to make it.

500 feet.

Noran gulped. “The Heavens have mercy on me.” He muttered to himself.

Suddenly the demon shot up, and with a scream and screech the platform shattered, spraying people and debris through the air.

“What is going on?” Someone yelled up in the throne room, running to the side and peering over the ledge.

The cultist shined his feeble torch below.

There was nothing to see.

By the time the cultists atop the Sacrificial Chamber pulled the chains of the platform back up, only jagged fragments of timber remained.

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Some storyline spoilers revealed in the image lol.

Tom Waits- Starving In The Belly Of A Whale

Demonify Commission by  theroguez with some minor additional characters by myself!