Saga of the Ruined One: New Original Work Posted on Ao3!
Hello everyone! I just uploaded the first chapter of an ongoing original fantasy story that I've been writing on and off for the last 3 years or so to Ao3. Please check it out if you'd like and feel free to leave any comments or feedback! I'm trying to get more eyes on the story so I'll hopefully have more motivation to write chapters in the future, lol
Here is the link to the story so far: https://archiveofourown.org/works/83084046/chapters/218796691
And if you don't feel like clicking the link this time, I've even pasted the first chapter under the break for you to read if you want >:3c
Thanks and enjoy!
Chapter 1: The Sound from the Barley Field
Morning broke over the vast fields of grain that stretched from the Bleak Forest in the south to the Domain of Creatures in the north. The river Dawn glimmered in the amber light of the waking day, its clear streams ostensibly dyed to match the color of the overgrown barley straws through which it wound its familiar course. It was the peak of harvesting season out in the Frontier, and yet this bountiful plain stood undisturbed by all but the gentle autumn wind descending from the Great Crags in the west. No frontierscreatures had risen with the sun to leave their homes and reap the potential stores of grain that could easily last their families through the coming winter months. No one dared even approach this place, for the sounds of rustling flora and babbling waters were also accompanied by something much more sinister: the quiet cacophony of rattling bones.
This maddening sound had been echoing across the plain for the better part of the year, and it had only gotten louder over the recent months. Every morning the families living on the Frontier's edge would wake to the constant noise in their ears sounding fuller, more purposeful than the previous day. By now, many had already packed up their belongings and left the small community out of fear, retreating back north to the safety of the Domain of Creatures. Only those most faithful that the incessant noise would eventually cease now remained. But each one of them still had a seed of doubt rooted in their hearts. They all knew that they would not be able to reap the harvest this year, that the barley would freeze along with them in the deadly white winter.
One night that autumn, when the moon was full, a young rabbit doe’s daughter was looking out at the rolling hills silhouetted against the bright backdrop of the night sky. Off in the distance, an unfamiliar form stood unwavering among the swaying barley stalks. She squinted and turned her still-growing ears toward it, but still could not fully make it out. Her curiosity now overwhelming, she took up the candle from the wall of her small room and carried it outside to see what had so suddenly appeared in the familiar field before her. Slowly, she entered the thick wall of barley straw and trudged over to the object. As she came upon the thing and shone her meager light upon it, she beheld two thick, white stalks in the midst of the thinner golden ones surrounding them. The roots extending below them were segmented and oddly shaped, and did not seem to actually enter the ground. The girl lifted the candle up and took her gaze with it, realizing that the two white stalks connected at the top, with much more extending to a height at least twice that of hers and topped with what looked like white tree branches. She froze in fear, and even with her ears folded flat she could still hear the revolting creaking sound to which she and her family had grown so familiar, now amplified to a paralyzing drone due to her proximity to the thing. Its every movement, however minute, produced an individual sound that amounted to a terrifying clangor of bone grinding against bone. It shakily turned the decrepit stag’s skull attached to its neck down to look at the young rabbit. It stared at the kit for what felt like an eternity while she still could not find the will to move her legs and get away from it. In its expressionless face, she could somehow see melancholy, even sadness, through its stained teeth and empty eye sockets.
Her legs then finally following her instincts, the girl turned and ran as fast as she could through the brush and back into her young mother’s house. As she stood panting in her small room, she couldn’t help taking a glimpse back towards the hill where she had beheld the creature of bone, where it had beheld her. It had made no effort to follow her, not even having taken a single step towards her family's simple home. Its only movements now gave the impression that it was sobbing. It covered the voids of its eyes with one segmented, bony arm and turned, stepping back over the hill and out of sight. The young woman's kit was greatly frightened through the next morning, even after all the remaining residents of the Frontier community had come to her and tried to comfort her roiling mind. No one wanted to believe the words she spoke. If what she claimed to have seen was truthfully there that night, all of their looming fears that had been growing throughout the year would be confirmed. Whether it came from the bite of hunger, the chill of winter, or the undead creatures just over the horizon, it did not matter.
They all knew certain death would come in place of the harvest that year.
