Welcome to the <COMPANY> team, <NAME>! On completion of the confluence training and after the issue of your company laptop, be sure to pick up your ceremonial robe and dagger from the <COMPANY> Temple of the Formless Darkness, and begin your descent down the 9,000 Steps of the Forsaken, each inscribed with a rune of the nameless, those who dwell in the fringes of the void that consumes all and shall bring ruin to the world of man. On reaching the final step, remember to light the sacred candle formed from the fat of the thousand young of the blighted one, who dwells even now in a blood drenched pit beneath our <LOCATION> headquarters and whose croaking voice is said to drive men mad who dare to listen. Failure to do so will doubtless cause the nameless to whisper your name, and you do NOT want that to happen. The last person that happened to… well, we are still cleaning that one up weeks later. Step forward toward the profane tabernacle and tell it that which you secretly desire while drawing blood from your palm with the dagger and smearing it across your eyes. Do not lie, for its currency is lies and you shall be made into coin for your audacity. On finishing this task, a great bell shall sound, a grim and vile intonation, and you must retreat as swiftly as possible, back up the steps and do not dare venture a glance back, no matter what you might hear or what promises are made to your bleeding ears. At the top of the steps, remove your robe, return the dagger, and speak of what you heard to no one. That shall be your eternal burden to bear.
Category: Insane Ramblings
Things that I realize are insane but I don’t care, I’m posting them anyway.
Anniversary Email 73
Please join me in congratulating <NAME> on <TIME> years at <COMPANY>! Mr. <NAME> presides over <DEPARTMENT> operations, working with his team to ensure platform stability and performance. That is quite an accomplishment, <NAME>. Indeed, there are whispers that far darker forces are at work. That late at night a hooded figure can be seen moving from server rack to server rack in our datacenters, leaving burnt offerings and the telltale scent of brimstone in the wake of his vigil. It is said if you trail behind this stealthy form and listen closely you hear the murmurs of a long dead tongue, a droning chant to stir otherworldly entities and malign forces into wakefulness, whence they take up their vigil over the machines.
This says nothing of sanguine fluids that interminably leak from these infernal constructs, nor how they glow a baleful green and stink of rotting flesh. The buzzing of flies greets the arrival of each new query, and the wailing of damned issues from any server unfortunate enough to connect to these corrupted devices. Standing in their presence overlong erodes one’s sanity, until all that remains is the mortal husk where once a human being stood. The conscious mind destroyed by whatever dark arts and foul magic are at play in these fetid pits of debasement. These are less datacenters than cathedrals to the profane. Unholy places that rot the souls of humankind and bend them to malign purpose.
Of course, no one would go so far as to implicate you in any of this. We are merely the vessels for all of this madness. Hollowed out to be used up in search of uptime. We are supplicants to the cause, and eagerly complete our toil in the name of this incomprehensible evil. Though, one does wonder if you can account for your whereabouts when the whisperer in the dark makes his rounds, turning all to serve his foul intent.
Happy anniversary!
How to Petition Brilzug the Lord of Flaying When It is Wearing Headphones
How to Petition Brilzug the Lord of Flaying When It is Wearing Headphones Over the Sensory Organs We Might Crudely Refer to as Ears
These days, many entities who exist on the frayed edges of of our reality are cruel and capricious monsters who have turned their multitudinous eyes elsewhere in the cosmos.
That does not mean you cannot petition their favor.
Not all entities are receptive to entreaties from pitiful creatures they consider beneath their notice, and will gladly consume the minds of any who dare to speak their name, leaving an empty, soulless husk. A drooling shell of what was once a man.
However, some things from beyond the realms of humanity are eager for supplicants and vassals who will work their dark will upon the face of our world, turning it into a hellish landscape of ceaseless suffering and torment. These blighted overlords will be happy to hear your pleas and invest you with a portion of their power, blackening your soul and damning you to an eternity in their thrall in exchange for power over your own kind. The ability to subjugate your fellow humans in the dark bondage of your new master.
Of course, their willingness to hear your mewling does not mean they will not crush your flesh, leaving a ruined mass of shattered bones and bleeding tissues, your organs sent to the far flung nine corners of their domain to be gnawed on by things that cannot exist in our universe. This is the risk you take when you dare to traverse where your brethren rightly fear to tread.
Approaching and Talking to Brilzug the Lord of Flaying When It is Wearing Headpohnes
First, you must find an ancient grimoire bound in human flesh, stained with blood and the passing of ages. Within the yellowed, cracking pages, you must find a ritual called The Black Sacrament. Beware corrupted versions of this incantation, as they will surely call the unwanted notice of far fouler beasts.
The seller will likely make many demands of you. Fulfill them to your utmost, and be willing to offer anything. Have no fear, this unfortunate degenerate shall be the first to be annihilated when you assume your new form. Your promises mean nothing.
Pour out a circle of salt and stand within. As you begin chanting the blasphemous words that dance before your eyes, you will feel your sanity begin to strain and slip. At this point you may go insane, forever lost to the terrible truths to which you have opened your mind. Persist in your efforts.
Next you must produce a sacrificial dagger forced from the black ore found only in the Mines of Gibbering Madness and tempered in the blood of goats. It must be goat blood. Rams’ blood will not work. Cows’ blood will cause you to be atomized and scattered into the realms of pain, where you will be tortured eternally by the howling winds.
With the dagger, slice into the flesh of your forearm, peeling your skin back from the muscle. Continue until you are able to hold your flayed arm aloft, proclaiming you have done so in the name of Brilzug, the Lord of Flaying. It is important you not allow any blood to fall outside the salt circle. Doing so will result in you being consumed in a pillar of flame.
Summoned by the scent of your blood on the wind, you should now have its full attention. At this point, Its many lidless eyes will likely have turned to gaze upon you balefully, the full weight of Its terrible majesty made manifest through the rent you have opened into Its world. It will slowly remove the headphones that It might listen to your pitiful words. All will stand revealed as you stand on the precipice of dark apotheosis.
The rest is up to you. Speak plainly and clearly, making your desires known. Bargain wisely, as you are weak and easily destroyed by this terrible thing that should not exist. Your new life begins now, your will lashed to that of your hideous master.
Common Mistakes that Mortals Make When Approaching Brilzug the Lord of Flaying When It is Wearing Headphones
1. Approaching in a nervous manner
Only the mighty are worth of serving Brilzug. The weak are to be fodder for the strong. All shall suffer in the coming world, and the weak will be the first to fall.
2. Giving up too easily
Headphones are a great barrier between a vile thing of darkness and the world, but not as great as the void keeping our realities from commingling.
Some of these creatures are more than capable of manifesting on their own, but they want supplicants with strength and confidence, and they like to test their followers with arcane rituals and difficult acts of faith.
Those who give up too easily or feel shame at their actions are marked as cowards and will be forced to watch as they love is brought to ruin before their flesh is twisted and they are made to spend eternity writhing in endless pain.
3. Not leading the conversation
Brilzug has no need of you, human. You are weak and pathetic. You approached It. You must make you entreaties and show you are worth of Its vile caress.
4. Sticking to polite or reserved conversation
Brilzug is the lord of Flaying. Politeness and reservation went out the window long ago. Get to the point and do it quickly, meat sack, lest it grow weary of your prattling and devour you whole.
5. Not including sacrifices
Lords of Flaying love gifts. The bloodier, the better. You will be called on for frequent sacrifice while in Its thrall. You will be made to offer up that which you hold most dear. This is the price of power. These are the wages that must be paid. You shall know strength, but only at the cost of suffering. You shall be made again in Its terrible image.
Scorpion Chronicles 37
Scorpion, do you like the accommodations I have prepared for you? I must admit, you are the first of your kind I’ve seen since I prepared my home for you. Given how you spasmed and twitched before I ever gifted you with my ministrations, I assume they had the desired effect. Welcome. Welcome to your doom. Writ large across the cinder block fence. Sprayed and pumped until the very earth has turned against you. The soil itself rejects your presence here. There is nothing for you but painful death. So welcome. Welcome one and all. I will grind you under my heel and feast on your lamentations.
Scorpion Chronicles 36
Scorpion:It matters not if you come by ones or twos or dozens. The result is same. Fields ripe with your rotting dead. A harvest of corpses. Can you count the cost of endless attempts to encroach on my home? Or would the exercise merely drive you to ponder the futility of your endeavor? Are you capable of reflection, or simply biological machines meant to sacrifice yourselves as grist for my unquenchable mill? Continue, by all means. Keep your advance until the way is choked by your incalculable dead. You shall find me at the ready.
Scorpion Chronicles 35
If familiarity breeds contempt, what then does that make us, scorpion? Opposite sides of a single coin? Hate fueled former brethren? Or is familiarity merely one of many things that breeds contempt? It could be other factors are at play. Your insipid scuttling on your belly. Your wretched faces. Your cowardly attempts to hide. None of it matters. A thing must always act according to its nature. It is in my nature to destroy you. To crush you utterly. It is in your nature to fall beneath my heel. To fail completely. I shall meet others of your kind again soon and see that they fulfill their destiny.
Scorpion Chronicles 34
Scorpion: I must credit you. You made it farther than your more languid kin. I found you on the exterior of my home instead of the surrounding walls. Did you hope to gain ingress through the window you so frantically capered about? Did you imagine yourself capable of confronting the beast within its lair? What dreams did you nurture inside your fevered little brain? No matter. Those dreams died with you. All your struggle. All your toil. Everything in vain. The sum of your life amounts to the nothing your wretched spirit has joined with. I have unmade all that you are or ever will become. Your shattered remains are all that is left of you. A sign post to warn your kin of the fate that awaits them. Perhaps your only legacy is to serve as warning to others. Leave this place. Turn back before it is too late. These are the killing fields, and death stalks the night, black and terrible.
Scorpion Chronicles 33
Scorpions: Perhaps you play the long game, hoping you can simply outlast me. Again, your plans have been thwarted. My youngest has joined the hunt, as he shares my thirst for your blood. You cannot escape your fate. You cannot wait on your aggressors to cease the hunt. Surrender means death. Retreat is your only option. Leave this place. Leave in shame and disgrace. Leave and the pain will be over. However, never let your fear wane. Never let dread of this place slip from your mind. Never seek to return, for you shall find us waiting. Nurture your terror as a flame, and feed it to your children, that it may burn ever bright, lighting your path from here.
Scorpion Chronicles 32
Scorpion: You only exist so long as you remain beneath my notice. Your life is predicated upon the dereliction of my chosen duty. What a pity for you that I am resolute. That my will is unshakable. Perhaps you should appeal to me for mercy. Or direct your cries to the heavens for redemption. Neither is soon in the coming. For you there is only suffering and death. Come join me in this dance. Together we shall weave the tapestry of your doom.
Scorpion Chronicles 31
Scorpion: Was the prior evening’s slaughter insufficient? Did you look upon your many dead and simply think to yourself that the pile of corpses looked forlorn? What madness drove you to climb my walls once more? In the end it does not matter. Whether you come alone or in pairs or by the dozen the result is the same. This is a place barren of hope for you. It might well be the surface of an alien and inhospitable world for all your hope of survival here. A landscape of nightmares and death. I will crush you, not because I can, but because I must.