Description
Umeruguu is as thick and squat as an Ironwood stump and probably as
immovable. He's tall for a duergar, standing a little over five feet in
height. That extra height is necessary to keep him from looking like a
perfect square, for his broad shoulders and powerful legs make him nearly as
wide as high. His chest bulges out, threatening to tear itself free of
whatever armor he wears. Arms and legs, chorded with the same thick muscle,
are also precariously restrained within sleeves and leggings. Physically, he
cuts an imposing figure.
His eyes are pulled wide and dart with manic intensity. They are red and
swollen. Whether that is from too much drink, too little sleep, or the
manifestation of internal hatred and rage, you cannot say. Perhaps it is some
combination of them all. There is a predatory gleam in those eyes and cunning
that would make any ordinary person uncomfortable.
He has an oily, unruly head of hair with a great black beard to match. It is
unclear if they have ever seen a brush or comb, but it seems unlikely. Indeed
his entire appearance is barbaric. No care has been given to his hygiene or
armor and weapons. Certainly, nothing at all has been done to cleanse them of
the copious blood that covers them.
Role
Scene 1: Naked in the Desert I
Added Mon Dec 27 21:08:31 2021 at level 38:
From a distance, death must look like the end of a storybook. But, as a
hangman, I have seen death a hundred times. When you're up close, when you
can hear the heaving breaths of the condemned, see the terror in their eyes
as the hood slips over their head, listen to the wooden squeal of a trapdoor
opening, and hear the final, dull snapping of the neck, you know death for
what it is. A simple thing. No glory. No glamour. Just gone.
Death doesn't come at the end of a tale. It comes at the end of my rope.
Urdrurn Drol, the leader of a no-account gang of Hamsah Mu'tazzian thugs
called the "Crows," found himself at the end of my rope. Like all my
'customers,' it wasn't personal. I just did my job. But Drol's associates
didn't see it that way. They saw it as an affront worth avenging in the most
severe way they could imagine.
That's how I find myself naked, beaten, near death, and desperately clawing
my way through the Sands of Sorrow trying to get to my captured family.
My life has disintegrated into fragmented moments of extreme fear and
suffering. New and unfamiliar sensations define it. A dull throb somehow
produces sharp pain in my head from where a thug blackjacked me. The burn of
the sand under my palms and knees. The dryness of my mouth. The cracking of
my lips. The ever-present terror that a benign mound of sand will suddenly
burst alive with angry chaos runners wielding deadly blades.
Then there is the heart-stopping fear for my little brother, sister, and
mother. I don't know what Urdurn Drol's men will do to them in the name of
vengeance.
The sun sets on me for the second time, and the adrenaline that once gave
determination to my steps has long faded. I am alone in the night, afraid and
defeated. The cooling sand is as welcoming to my burned body as the Abyss is
to my broken soul.
Then I think of the faces of Drol's men.
In the encroaching fog of death, I see their smug expressions. I hear their
self-congratulatory insults and the echoes of their laughter. I look into
their eyes and see the look of men who have won and who know it. Men who
think themselves better than Umeruguu Uu'Gen the hangman. Men who dumped me
in the Sands of Sorrow without hope for survival. Men who are torturing my
family right now.
And I cannot abide it
Scene 1: Naked in the Desert II
Added Mon Dec 27 21:09:11 2021 at level 38:
A feeling like fire fills my mind, burning away the fog. It flashes like
lightning, and my eyes open. Like the torrent of a river, it courses through
my body and demands my muscles find their vigor. I push my chest off the sand
and place my right foot in front of me. Heaving myself up, I stand for the
first time in more than a day.
My Rage for the Crows and this damnable desert propels me onward. As the day
breaks, everything seems like a bleached mirage. The sun is a malevolent fat
troll that squats over the desert, burning my naked skin and punishing me as
I dare to walk beneath it. But neither it nor the shifting sands can stop me
now. Step by determined step, I press forward until I stand before the gates
of Hamsah Mu'tazz.
Scene 2: The Fight I
Added Mon Dec 27 21:12:34 2021 at level 38:
I have never skulked around the tunnels of the Underdark, but as I approach
my home in Hamsah Mu'tazz, I find my body knows stealth. My footsteps fall
like rose petals on the grave. I hear the slosh of hastily guzzled water from
the city fountain in my belly.
I hear the nearly inaudible creak of floorboards beneath my feet, and I hear
the muffled voices of men inside my apartment.
Fear is so palpable within me that it slithers in my stomach like a thousand
eels trying to flee some ethereal phantom. I want to turn and run. To change
my name and go far away. Start a new life. But I cannot just abandon my
family. That's why I'm here, right? To save them? Or am I here because of the
Rage that blooms quietly in my depths?
I gently pull the handle of my door. Five men are within, rifling through my
belongings, looking for the gold I've earned roping the necks of the
condemned. As I suspected, it is Urdrurn Thul's Crows. Each man is a killer
with a wicked knife or cudgel hooked to his belt. I am unarmed.
I try to swallow. The fear settles into my bones, and I am stuck in time,
teetering between two futures. One where I slip away before I am seen - the
other which is likely very short.
Despite my trembling hands and racing heart, the Rage that took me from the
desert still smolders within. Hearing the voices of my adversaries, seeing
them toss aside my meager possessions like worthless rags, smelling their
stink again, and remembering their taunts as they left me naked in the desert
to die, stokes the fire of my wrath. I clench my fits into balls of hate and
bite down with such ferocity that my jaw trembles.
I boil with waves of righteous Rage that carry me to crash on the shores of
my fate. The fear from a short moment ago is incinerated. Lesser emotions
cannot touch me. I am righteous fury. Unvirtuous ideals have no place within
me. I am a raging torrent, cleansed of mortal weakness.
I am untouchable.
I slip forward. Two shocked men go down in unconscious heaps without even
reaching for weapons. I take a knife from one of them and continue my
assault.
The knife's hilt jolts in my hand as the blade carves through the leather
armor, bone, and flesh of the third man. I feel the heat of blood sluicing
down my arm. Hear the puking as it comes out of the man's mouth. I pull the
knife upward from his belly, holding his weapon hand down, and saw. I stop
shy of his heart so that he will continue to scream. I trip him and ride his
momentum down to the ground, rolling forward then upward to my feet. I land
in front of the next man.
Scene 2: The Fight II
Added Mon Dec 27 21:16:14 2021 at level 38:
That thug reaches for his cudgel, and I stuff my hand over his, jamming his
weapon in its loop. I'm so close to him that I can smell he's been drinking
my damn liquor. He sees the unbridled fury in my eyes and misses a beat. I
feel the spray of blood on my face as I slam the knife under his chin, angled
back, so I stick his brainstem on the point of my blade. Reminds me of an
apple on a stick. He falls forward, wet hands desperately trying to hold in
the life that's streaming out his neck.
Four down. One to go.
This man must be the Crow's new leader. I don't know his name, but I know he
didn't come by his position by being a pansy-sniffer. His lips peel back in a
sneer.
I lunge forward with a slash to his face. It glances off his helmet. I parry
the first trust of his dagger easily, knowing it would be a gutshot. Thugs
always go for the gutshot. I quickly dodge three more of his slashes. He's an
experienced fighter, but he relies on fear and intimidation to create
momentum. In the fire of my Rage, I feel nothing but a thirst for his blood
that must be sated. The table's turn and it is he who is afraid.
His thrusts become tentative and too careful. I press him as his wide eyes
search for escape. I circle to my left, away from the door, offering him
what he seeks. As he tries to bolt out of the little room, my knife severs
his roots. First, a deep gash on his right thigh. Then dropping to one knee,
I slam the point of my knife through the top of his foot and pin that fucker
to the floor.
His screams join those of his eviscerated friend and the fading whimpers of
the thug with the hemorrhaging neck.
"WHERE'S ME FEKKIN' FAMILY?!" I roar, my voice bestial with Rage.
"Okay, okay!" Drol's replacement throws his dagger aside in surrender. He
tries to pull the knife from his foot, but he can't stomach the pain, so he
gives up and tries to stop the flow of crimson blood running from his thigh
instead.
I grab the rope I use to make my nooses and bind the two unconscious men and
their leader as best as I can. I put them side-by-side in wooden chairs.
Under threat of death, the thugs reveal my family's location: a bandit camp
in the Araile. The leader says the bandits will sell them into slavery, but
something doesn't look right in his eyes. A lie?
I go to my dirty laundry and find three especially rank socks. Each man gets
one shoved in his mouth. As they gag and their eyes begin to tear, I make
myself plain.
"If yer lyin' ta me, ya feks, yer ain't gonna like what happens when I'm
returnin'."
With the tip of my knife, I slowly point to the crotch of each man in turn.
Their eyes go wide with abject horror.
Scene 3: Houseguests I
Added Mon Dec 27 21:21:30 2021 at level 38:
Once again, I find myself back under the beating heat of the desert sun. I
march through the sand toward where the Crows say the bandits are. Even
though I am now clothed and carry water for myself and my family, I decide I
forever hate the sun and sand.
I grind my teeth. Actually, I realize that I am actually starting to hate
absolutely everything.
I crest a dune and find a scene of horror. Amongst the sea of sand, the
remains of my mother, brother and sister hang upon wooden poles blistering
and naked. The poles that puncture them are as thick as my wrists, sharp at
the point and tapered. Each has been driven into the anal cavity of the
victim to the point of perforating the mid-torso. In death, their legs droop,
backs arch, arms wing out and downward, and heads recline backward as if they
perished in exaltation. Sockets picked clean by the birds stare at the sky.
A wooden sign has been pounded into the sands before them. It bears the
message:
HERE LIES THE UU'GEN CLAN
MOTHER, BROTHER, SISTER TO UMERUGUU UU'GEN THE HANGMAN
HE TIED THE ROPE THAT HANGED URDRURN DROL, LEADER OF THE CROWS
WITNESS THE COST HE PAYS
WOE TO ANY WHO DARE CROSS US
I stumble toward the bodies of my family in shock. I feel as if my mind is
aware they are dead, but that my heart is not. I am so numb my ears ring with
a low buzz like I have stood too close to the bell that sounded the death
knell of my only loved ones.
My kid brother, Elbuuruu.
My big sister, Eilneera.
My mother, Erfin, who taught us the wicked ways of the duergar after my
nameless father abandoned her.
A sound comes from Elbuuruu. A whispering.
Gods. He is alive. Barely more than a boy, a soft beard covers his face. His
cracked lips part, trying to say something more. I give him water from my
canteen. Most of it spills down his chest. He tries to speak again. I edge
closer to him, fighting tears. "The... Abyss. Brother. Send me..."
It's then that I notice my mother and sister still wheeze, their burned skin
rising and falling with each insidious breath. My mind cannot fathom the
suffering. There are no tracks in the sand but mine. How long have they been
like this?
I pull my knife. Its hilt is warm from the sun. Tension travels down my arm
as the blade penetrates Elbuuruu's chest and then his heart. Next, my sister.
My mother's body trembles softly with the cries she is too weak to form
fully. "Be with them," I whisper and ram my knife into her breast. She jerks
and then is still.
Scene 3: (previous chapter titled incorrectly) The Family II
Added Mon Dec 27 21:26:45 2021 at level 38:
They are all three still.
My knees sink into the hot sand before I know I've fallen to them. Unwanted
tears sting my eyes. My grief is like a dark sea, and I a drowning man. How
is this possible? Why couldn't I save them?
I am a maelstrom of emotions.
Love, for my lost kin.
Guilt, for not saving them.
Sorrow, for my loss.
Fear, that the Crows will find and kill me.
Shame, for my failure and the sobs that shake my body.
For the second time in two days, I find myself wishing for death with my face
in the sand. And, like the last time, I begin to feel the smoldering rage
stoke into flame. This time, tormented as I am, I surrender to it completely.
As it burns away my tears, so too does it burn away love, guilt, sorrow,
fear, shame, and every other emotion there is.
My very soul hot with hate, I rise from the sand. My body roars with such
fury that there is nothing else within me. I am reborn. Lesser emotions,
lesser virtues have all been chased away by the one true virtue: Holy Rage.
Unwilling to ever again try to contain this power, I pound the sands back to
Hamsah Mu'tazz.
For I have houseguests.
Scene 4: Houseguests
Added Mon Dec 27 21:28:54 2021 at level 38:
There is a penis on the floor of my apartment.
It lies there inert, like a hairless caterpillar bathing in scarlet. It's
there because its former owner expired before I could get around to feeding
it to him. Alas, Rage has not lent itself to good planning. Carnage, on the
other hand? My apartment will testify to its capacity for that.
Before me is an artists' work. A masterpiece of violence. A holy tribute to
the god of Rage. I slump into a chair, not caring about the squish of blood
and dead flesh as I do. It has been thirty-seven straight hours of mayhem
that only ended because the mortal coil of the three Crows, at last, gave in
to my savagery.
With their lives went the hottest flames of my fury, and now I feel weary to
the bone. And hungry. I pick up someone's thumb and gnaw on it, glad for the
readily available sustenance.
I'm going to have to move.
The entirety of the room is adorned with different hues of crimson. Some are
splattered, like when a fast-moving carriage splashes muddy water onto a
white-washed building. Some are in denser puddles, more like a spilled
bucket. Three days of three men's blood mingles on my floor, four walls, and
ceiling.
There are a variety of small body parts lying everywhere. Fingers, toes, the
crumpled glop that was someone's eyelid. A chunk of purple flesh that was a
lower lip. One man's dark gray hand and wrist is on the ground, its base
bound with one of my ropes. That I tightened again and again until the limb
died. Then I sawed it free.
Swallowing the last of my snack, I look at my houseguests, all swollen,
bloody, bound, and dead. Cuts mar each one from head to whatever toes remain.
Ligature marks snake their way around every limb and neck. I wish I knew a
healer that could have kept them alive longer so that I could multiply their
suffering over weeks instead of days.
I never realized just how much I was missing out on by hanging my victims -
what a waste. I could have had so much more fun! This has all been a somewhat
unexpected benefit to my newfound Rage.
And I have no intention of stopping here. All the world must know of my gift.
All must feel my Rage.
A Short Summary of Previous Chapters
Added Mon Dec 27 21:30:04 2021 at level 38:
Umeruugu Uu'Gen was a hangman based out of Hamsah Mu'tazz. When he hangs the
leader of the 'Crows,' a gang of thugs, they take reprisal by leaving him
naked in the Sands of Sorrow and giving his family a gruesome, torturous
death.
Rage overcomes Umeruugu and saves him the desert. It overcomes his fear and
gives him the strength to overtake the thugs. It overcomes his guilt, shame,
and sorrow when he finds his family barely grasping to life and must send
them to the Abyss himself to spare them further suffering. And finally, he
learns the joys of surrendering to Rage when he binds and tortures the
remaining Crows for three bloody days
He resolves the world will know his Rage and seeks Morius as his patron. His
quest is simple: find the way to visit the most hateful fury upon Thera.
PK Wins
Dec 22, 2021|Lv 29|Darsylon|Eilela vs 2: [29] Kraatlul (76%), [29] Umeruguu (23%, thrust)
Jan 2, 2022 |Lv 51|Galadon|Rokzar vs 2: [51] Umeruguu (76%, gouge), [51] Xshwa (23%)