Animal crossing on hard mode
Konrad Curze x Reader
Being in the Warhammer universe is one thing but now with a 9 foot tall gargoyle, raiding your pantry you can’t think of any way this could get any worse.
Tw | Harm to an animal | Implications of mass murder | Choking | Death Threats | Implied stalking | Animal Abuse | OOC Konrad
Konrad Sounds Like this Wonderful Performance
_________________________________________________________________
06:00 am
There are only two ways for you to calculate the passage of time, the automatic calendar by your bedside and the pocket watch to pair it. Both resemble an antique retro design with a clean silver finish, neither tell what year it is.
_________________________________________________________________
September
12th | 06:01 AM
_________________________________________________________________
It has been approximately 6 months since you woke up on this asteroid. Living on the surface of a large rock wasn’t easy to adapt to. But the rock had life to it, one cow, that gave birth one month ago and the calf seems to confuse your hair for grass at times, eight chickens, two roosters, three lambs, two rams. And none else but lemon trees and seeds you had to grow yourself. But you make it work. Past the flimsy fence around the property lies a dense forest, none of the trees are recognisable to you. All of them resemble the western evergreen forest you’ve only seen on tv maybe a few parks from your home town had them. Specialized imported non native to the land. Plus the permanent state of twilight that the sky resided in was a beautiful marvel at every point of the day.
You’re in the Warhammer universe, not exactly sure at what point in time, but you could tell that as three days in An Eldari craft world passed by. The design, the shape, the look all resemble the ones your ones in all the lore videos you’ve watched. And trust that very revelation had you vomiting and in a sleepless panic for a week straight. No one found you, not yet, and pray to the universe no one does.
Going through your regular routine felt robotic, bath, breakfast and then work all day every day for survival. The small cabin you live in held up well, it had basic solar panels, a chimney, lights but a medieval oven. It was spacious enough too, The upper floor small space completely dedicated to your bed. And down the steps to the loft were a more spacious kitchenet. No running water, but a connected tank you collect from every now and again, and if its not filled, the lake a kilometre away is your only other source. You thank whatever god that dropped you here at least they gave you a generous starter kit, basic farm equipment and some extras.
You mauver though your small cabin, getting into comfortable jeans, a coat and boots for the chilly autumn cycle which your space rock is currently on as per the calendar.
Exiting your home, you start off with the simple but difficult chore of raking of the leaves on the front yard. Making a clear pathway, to the barn and just for the sake of cleanliness, living alone for so long structure and organisation one of the few things keeping you from losing your mind. It not easy, but the past six months have shaped you out of your city habits and into the rugged farm life routine. You’re a farmer now, so you embrace it.
The atmosphere is still so alien so unfamiliar to the home your used to, from a sub-Saharan desert to a boreal forest was a real mind fuck. But what else can you do but adapt to living on this space rock? Or moon you’re not sure what this land mass is. All you know is that when the mania of living here broke in, and you wondered around this environment for long enough, you found yourself going in circles getting lost.
Theres a planet nearby, the asteroid orbits it. You’re sure it has life, what you assume are city lights sprinkle along the land mass Durning the night cycle. Although the continents don’t match the ones you were taught back in high school geography.
The leaves are organised into piles, not sure what else to do but pray no strong winds undo the hard work done. You place the rake by the porch and get a clean bucket for some fresh milk.
The short walk to the barn is soured by the sight of paw prints and remnants of digging under the wire fence of the chicken coop.
“Mother fucker” ‘A wolf?’ The thought crosses your mind ‘no the prints are too small… doesn’t seem like a dog either…I’ll deal with it later It later’
Having a predator in your coop is bad, anxiety is already been wreaking your mind on the longevity if these animals.’ Will they be a good food source in the long run? Can you live on chickens forever? will your garden fair well with the seeds you’ve harvested so far? How long till you starve?’ The thoughts drift in and out of your mind all the time.
The barn is large, and spacious, enough for all the animals, significantly bigger than your little cabin. Inside the air is cold the temperature almost lower than outdoors. Your greeted by the lovely crowd with the ambiance of moos, and whatever other sounds sheep and ram make. There’s no fire place in this barn, no electrical ports, no solar panels or way you can figure out to bring some warmth in here before snowfall arrives.
Every day the soft chill gets harsher and you can tell the livestock feel it. The only the work experience you’ve had was from working at a call centre, and dropping out of Veterinary College half way though. A farm is past your qualification.
Pumpkin, that’s the name you gave her, she’s friendly, has a reddish fluff for fur and was your best friend, a gentle cow and out of all the menaces in this barn, she was your rock, the one who lead you back to the cabin back when you were still in shock and lost at your arrival. Her calf on the other had was the devil.
“Morning sweet heart” You greet pumpkin as you enter her pen, in the months you’ve been here it’s been spring, then summer sometimes you wonder Who took care of them before you? How can one have a ‘winter’ on an asteroid, you’re not sure but you sure as hell need some milk and butter.
Patting her head as you mauver past her excited calf already hungrily reaching for you for your pony tail. Not today junior” you gently grab the calf and gently guide them out of the pen, closing the behind them as it whines on the other side. Turning then to grab your stool and bucket, you pat pumpkin one more time before going to start milking her.
“Sometimes I wonder what would happen if this asteroid fell onto the planet”
“Do people live there pumpkin?” You asked the cow who could only moo in response “but I don’t want this asteroid gone I like you guys”
“I’m going insane……….” pause “I miss Tumblr”
You talk back and forth with yourself as you milked Pumpkin, hoping maybe she’d respond one day.
15:47 pm
You’re eating dinner early and alone, beans, chicken stir fry with a side of shitty homemade lemonade. Quite the fancy arrangement enough to make you feel better.
You mind wonders. ‘How long till I’m found?’ The world of Warhammer is unkind, too all, whether it be Drukari, Tau, Chaos or humans whom ever discovers your floating space rock first, won’t have the best intentions. The loneliness on this rock, is an icy rot at the back of your mind, six months of talking to a cow, six months isolated, six months of no contact with any sentient being at all.
‘I’d rather be found by orcs that Drukari Tho’
Its one bite into your chicken thigh before your well-lit kitchen darkens slightly, the natural light from the sun now seemingly blocked out. “Rain?” It was partially cloudy this morning, but clouds don’t darken this much instantly. A massive shadow covers your entire cabin.
‘its too early to be dark out, is?’ You step to your kitchenet window to get a good view of the sudden eclipse . Outside lies a ship…………. an imperial ship."
The Nightfall.
.
.
.
.
. That means Night Lords
.
.
.
“HOLY SHIT” wide eyes and beyond disbelief you stare outside your window before exiting though your back door for a better look. The ship goes past your little rock and makes it way to the planet below. They don’t seem to sense you in any way or have any plans on stopping by for drinks. But now? You know your fucked, all you can do is hope you go under their radar and if not …..die quickly. Still in awe you watch as more ships descend from the south all moving downward to the planet below.
“Not my monkey, not my circus”
Over the days more ships fly over the planet and you can only imagine what horrors The Night Lords are imparting onto the citizens below.
Over the 3 weeks the ships hover over the planet, occasionally sending bombs and nukes to the poor citizens below sometimes drop ships of marines being deployed and a light show in the sky. The native inhabitants below seem to be putting up a fight against the Night-Haunter and his men you assume. You want to care but, it getting colder Autumn is coming to a close you have no heating for your barn babies. The harvest is done, but can you honestly survive 3 months of snow? You’re not sure, but what you are sure of is that right now a fox has been trying to eat your Poultry for weeks and yesterday it made away with two hens. You can’t care about imperial conflicts right that now.
_________________________________________________________________
16:32 PM
Axe in hand, with the bravery of a first-born daughter you make your way into the forest past your yard. The hunt for one fox isn’t easy, you’re not an experienced hunter or trained to handle an axe in any way. Tracking a fox just based off of vibes was a great idea earlier but now, as the sun sets and the daylight warmth is gone you regret going this deep into the dense wild, earlier you could see the mist of your own breath and feel the chill in the air deepen.
Pulling out a flash light you decided to make your way home. It’s best to throw in the towel and maybe go make yourself some warm soup. Maybe throw in some homemade tea and biscuits as you reminisce on what your tomorrow will be. Possibly collect precious stones to make paint? You watched a tutorial on ancient dye making back in your old life…..You can figure it out.
“Your incompetent at tracking” For a moment you think you hallucinated a voice, maybe the months alone finally wore you down, and now your new company are the voices in your mind, but it’s too clear, too distinct to be a dream. There’s no identifiable location that voice could have come from. Left, right, up and down in the shock of hearing another human voice after months alone you turn every which way to figure out where its coming from, or if you’ve finally gone insane. West, you point it west and your faced with…dark blue fabric? You slowly lift the light tracking who or what this could possibly be. Pale dead skin, dark unkempt obsidian hair, and eyes darker than any void you’ve ever seen before and twice or three times your height. Some thing straight out of a horror movie. Is staring you down.
‘Fucking Slenderman?’ You panic, there are very few being that fit this very description and, telling by the ships from a few days ago, It’s not Corvus Corax.
You turn quickly to make a run for it, and before you could even panic further and get any distance between you and Slenderman, you trip on a tree root…. with your axe still in hand.
You feel yourself fall face forward in slow motion, anticipating a pain full kiss with a sharp edge of the blade in your grasp possibly a more merciful end then facing him.
A large hand catches you by the collar of your jacket, saving you from a possibly fatal land onto your axe. The sudden stop in momentum, the yank harshly on your neck choking you in the process
“Almost gave me a show” The voice spoke, its tone so eerie, so cold, each syllable sends a chill down your spine “Death by your own incompetence would have been so entertaining” You feel the very same hand lift you off the ground, brining you closer to meet his eyes.
Konrad Curze
“What,thefuck,what thefuck,what,the fuck,whatthefuck” The words stutter out of your mouth as you shakingly angle the light to get a better view of your visitor.
“How do you live here” You can barely process his words as with how uncomfortably your jacket collar is cutting off your air way and how frazzled your mind is. The Primarch cared little on how your collar now digs into your throat.
Dark obsidian eyes and paper white sickly pale skin is all you see, it doesn’t comfort you any further as you choke. The light slips past your fingers, as you do what any normal human would do, fight.
Flailing your arms to get out of the tight grip. Kick, scratch bite, that’s all your mind can think of doing in this moment.
“Answer me” The Primarch demands You can’t, you can’t even breathe as the position he has you in feels like your being hung by a noose. You flail further but your attempts are useless under his grip, and quickly you find yourself closer to losing consciousness. It’s like he’s made of iron, no nails break skin, no kicks even sound like they hurt. You don’t know how long or why he just stares at you in the dark, watching you struggle for air, scratch at his arm, the metal zipper of your coat now digging into the skin, nipping away causing the skin to break into a small wound.
“Weak” Your dropped, not even gently so, the fall only cushioned by the soft forest floors.
“WHAT THE FUCK” you yell after finally getting your ability to breathe back. You can barely see but you hear him speak casually as if he didn’t just choke you.
“I’ve been watching you for three days” The only light source you have illuminates his face from the ground up, the angle straight out of a classic horror flick. His eyes are void, no light bounces off them, like the absorb the life around them. “Are you associated with the population below” He tilts his head as he examines you with his eyes.
“I. No…no”
“Why and how do you have an atmosphere and biome on this Land mass” He inquires, You scramble for your flash light on the mossy floors that sit by his feet finally regaining some form of control, in this chaotic endeavour.
“I….I…I don’t know.”
He sneers not satisfied by your answer and by the time you can process your thoughts an arm is dragging you out of the forest, the rough hands grip to the point of bruising and he walks with no regard for how you’ll be able to keep up, basically being dragged like a rag doll.
“My men have detected no communication devices on this moon, no ship ports and no technology that can create artificial atmospheres.” He drops on your body to the ground after dragging you through the foliage. His eyes burn into your skull as you try to gather your frazzled mind. You can’t bring yourself to speak. His gaze dangerously intense as they fall onto small, lit cabin in the distance.
23 :56pm
It takes an hour for you to calm, and now with shaky hands your serving Konrad that very same shitty lemon juice you had this morning. The Konrad Curze is on your porch and you rather not join his screaming gallery so try to be a good host, to a genocidal maniac.
He’s strange, he asked you a few questions, some you could not answer yourself, you don’t know why your still alive un touched but take it as a win. ‘At least I’m not skinned alive’
The threat of your life hangs in the air at every step, how long till your dead Tortureor maimed, you’re not sure.
“I like this place its……. quite” He takes the jug straight from your tray, not bothering for the probably too small glasses right there. downing the lemon juice casualty while sitting on your porch stairs. Konrad wears no armour, seemingly dressed in casual dark blue robes. Seated like he owns the place, no care for the obvious fear and panic all over your face. He just sits there, and you stand, no idea what to do, or what he wants, the silence eats away at you for another minute before you throw all logic out the door.
“Okay what the fuck” Your tired, the first sentient human you’ve talked to in six months and its fucking Konrad Curze, in all hid crusty glory, after almost suffocating you.
“Are you talking to me like that mortal?” he doesn’t even turn to look at you head still tilted to face the planet ahead, that lies over the horizon. From here you can view the city lights, the clusters of the population that lived there, since Konrad got here, some of those clusters have gone dark.
“Yes” Your answer is curt and to the point. He now fully turns to you, those same dark void for eyes just stare, looking deeply into your soul he doesn’t speak, he just looks at you, or past you? You can’t tell. It takes another a moment before he spoke again.
“This asteroid is now mine, the animals are now all mine” He spoke with a casual tease. Theres audacity to his tine, a demining degrading lack of consideration to your hard work. All the nights, All the harvesting, all the maintenance, just for him to show up and declare it his.
“Wait ….no you can’t just come over take my home and announce it as yours” The rebuttal is shy, but it leaves your lips before you can even think. Impulse that’s all your instincts or brain can run on. “Well, who the hell do you think you are to just- “
“My name is Cáel,” That a lie, you know it’s a lie, he knows it’s a lie. You know his true name, best to not fuck around you sure don’t want to find out. ‘Best to play along and not piss off the cannibal’
“You Cael enter my home, no gift in hand, no greeting and you expect to be treated as a guest? And now you claim my home as yours?”
“Do you have any documentation to prove your owner ship?”
“No”
“So, its mine, now there’s a rodent feeding off my animals, and I want it gone” He speaks with a causal arrogance as if he expecting you to do it, or better yet, testing your patience.
“It’s your farm now.... you do it” If looks could kill you be dead. And right now, he looks both annoyed and entertained.
00:23pm
It doesn’t take Konrad, or better yet Cael long to collect to the fox. He was quick and efficient by the time you both you made your back into the forest. Within minutes he’s captured the fox. The poor thing lies in his hands helpless against the large superhuman. Konrad holds it tightly like how a child holds a new toy in its hand. The fox writhes visibly uncomfortable.
You don’t say much thinking heed be quick with it but he’s not, he squeezes, slow tight, unnecessary.
“Stop it” Nothing no response “don’t kill it”
“It tried to eat my stock” He paused “it stole from me”
“It’s an animal it doesn’t know better” his hand tightens and the sound of a pained animal reaches your ears. Framed now only by your trusted light, the pressure he puts on the fox already, just aggravates you further.
“STOP” Your request went ignored ”We can use him or reinforce the chickens coop fence please stop” No response, other than a smile, he has no care in the world for how the torture of a small animal puts you in a state of distress. Or better yet, he likes it, seeing the pain behind your empathy, the heart break and helplessness in your begging.
Your hands tighten around your axe as He could care less about your suggestion. He wants it to die, he’s purposefully crushing its slowly, painfully. And with the low number of fucks, you have to give you chuck your axe at him. He dodges of course offended that you would even try, but mildly entertained. You try again failing as the small fox in his fist fights for the last breath is has.
“LET HIM GO!” And on your third failed pathetic attempt at striking the Primarch in the dark woods. Your out of breath, your body and mind has been put through a lot of stress as you just stare at the dark forest floors and the axe in your grasp, trying to centre your mind, and drown out the sounds of a pained fox.
He lets go. The thud that echo’s when it lands leaves a silence in the air , with out wasting a second your scramble for the light, to find the fox in the dark night, and when you finally got a decent look with your light, you witness a weak rise and fall of its chest.
‘He’s alive’
Konrad laughs, an uncanny manic laugh, like all of this is some hilarious sitcom that dropped the funniest line in the season. The sound fades, he’s leaving . You gently bring the small animal into your arms and slowly make your way back to your cabin.
By the time you reached the barn he’s by the porch again, eyes up to the view the sky, with no regard for you or the badly injured fox in your arms. Theres a tense silence as you enter your home and lock the doors behind you, to do your best to help the little fox make it through the night.
06:57
The next morning he’s still there, still by your porch as you walk past him to go though your daily routine, you let pumpkin a junior roam in order to clean their stalls, lambs and goats too. you clean sweep, and collect eggs from the kitchen coop, occasionally going back to the cabin see if the fox is doing well and if the armature first aid is doing anything to help.
and when all is said and done and Konrad seems to be having a good old time occasionally showing up thought the day at the corner of your eye.
Just watching.
Eventually you find him in your pantry, hunched over digging through your pantry like an ogre, dried wild berries, lemon juice and more . The Primarch indulges in all the goodies you’ve grown and foraged over months.
“Don’t ever do that again” Your tone strict, now with more confidence, all logic is out the door as Konrad....Cael as he’d rather be known just rummages throughout your harvest.
“Don’t tell me what to do” He replies like moody teenager
‘This bitch’ You sigh, of all the things he could say “It’s my farm my food” He continued.
“Do you have any legal documentation to prove so?” You answer with as much sass as he had given you.
“No”He barely cared for your words making his way to your refrigerator, to eat some of your stored frozen poultry .... raw.
“Stop eating my food you dunce!” You try but you can’t Stop the giant whom takes up 70% of the space in your pantry from eating all your food” Konrad ignored just your attempts keep eating more.
You try to scold him the best you could and before you could even finish. An alarm in his pocket goes off, it lights up, possibly a communication device. And as if your nothing but a breeze he walks past you into, the kitchen making his way to the exit. He doesn’t even answer the device but it important enough he has to leave.
Not even caring to close the doors behind him. He walks back into the forest, “Where are you going?” Your left with silence and you don’t bother following him further to tired from the emotional rollercoaster of distress that past day and a half has been. He’s possibly going back to his ship the Nightfall, part of you hopes he return to keep you company, the other part hopes he nukes this entire small asteroid.
_________________________________________________________________
Back to being alone, you care for the little fox the best you can , a few thoughts going though your mind, as you do. ‘Why did he lie about his name’
‘Is he really Cael in this universe?’
________________________________________________________________
Part 2 coming soon
Pov : Y/n hearing Konrad introduce himself as Cael