Skin of the Sinless (Part 3)
Chapter 3: The One Who Understands All
Requiem looked down at his right hand carrying the claymore with thorned rosary binding them together. He let his blade drop next to him to hang freely by the rosary so he may use both hands to climb the vine. He dug his fingers into the vine making it bleed, and started climbing.
His claymore dangled from the rosary causing it to shred his forearm while the claymore etched patterns into his legs as it swayed back and forth. Requiem climbed through the darkness covered in blood for what felt like an eternity. He climbed until the face of the iron mask clanked against a stone ceiling where the vine suddenly ended.
Requiem swung his claymore up with his forearm that was torn through the muscle to catch it in his hand. He then jumped down onto the cold, stone floor of the labyrinth where his arm and legs healed themselves. Moans and groaning could be heard throughout the passage that had a random assortment of items placed against the walls. An unusual passage with the garden visible from where he stood on the opposite end.
The first item he had come across was a painting on the wall. The frame was made of a male and a female contorted together while being intimate. The canvas was made of stretched skin that was woven into the bodies of the couple with tendons. The frame shifted and moaned while they both dripped blood onto the canvas that took the shape of a bleeding heart that was anatomically correct.
They were lost souls that had given into their greatest sin only to relinquish their bodies and humanity for eternal pleasure. So much suffering. Requiem used his free hand to rip the painting from the wall. He pried the two souls apart as they screamed in pleasure and pain, using his foot to pin it to the ground as he did so. Their sins burned themselves onto his skin before he pressed forward to the next item with tears falling from under his iron mask.
The next obstacle obstructing Requiem’s path was a male rearranged into a dresser. His head sat on the top of the furniture made of muscle and bone, groaning in pleasure. The drawers vigorously went in and out on their own with blood and pus seeping out from the gaps onto the ground. Requiem slid his claymore through the top of the man’s head to silence him, then gave it a turn. Another soul, another sin, another scar and another tear.
The third was a bed in the middle of the passage that went from wall to wall blocking his path. He approached the bed with caution seeing that it too was a monstrosity. It was composed of four men and two women. The men’s bodies were spiraled into bed posts that stood at each corner with one of the women’s bodies stretched out into a mattress with her face in the middle. The other woman was made into a headboard with her distorted face in the middle, and her breasts placed at the head of the bed like pillows.
All bearing faces of pain while their bodies squirmed in pleasure. Requiem had enough of the heresy set before him. He cut the bed in half at the drop of his claymore. The bed screamed in pleasure and pain like the others before he ended their suffering altogether by smashing each one beneath his feet.
Tears fell from under Requiem’s mask as he made his way into the next chamber. Each one left the word ‘LUST’ on his body until there were no more. Requiem entered the chamber of the garden once more to be greeted by the little girl on the swing.
“You made it! Now we can continue our conversation. Please, come and take a dip. You’re filthy,” she exclaimed with a smile from ear to ear.
Requiem looked down at his scarred, naked body that was covered in blood before heading in the direction of the pond. He noticed a different group of children were present. The garden itself seemed even more beautiful than before. Requiem stepped into the pond submerging himself in the water. All while the little girl swung on her swing.
“You know that it’s quite rude to leave in the middle of a story,” scolded the little girl. She cleared her throat before continuing. “Hmmm, where was I? Oh, that’s right, so the being merged us into one to make us whole. It let us push on as one mind, one body but two souls. I was no longer a liability, and he was free to climb the tower while forever feeling my touch. I was also no longer scared…”
The little girl paused when Requiem exited the pond. “Not many make it past this floor as they are all welcomed in their domain. It won’t stop your progress and neither will I. The Sins and the tower have an agenda of their own.” Stated the little girl, pointing at the dark archway leading to the next chamber.
Requiem rested his claymore against his shoulder, and pushed on. He passed through the archway into an empty chamber made of violet flesh. The writhing chamber was made of countless bodies melted together that squirmed and moaned as one. Their hands reached up groping Requiem all over where he stood while he scanned the room for being the little girl spoke of.
He pointed his claymore downward to the ground, then plunged it into the living floor. It made the bodies quivering below him retreat away from his blade in ripples. Requiem looked down to see the chamber floor feebly holding a circle of arms up to shield itself from his claymore.
He then lifted his claymore from out of the floor to watch the stone be covered again with the bodies of many. Out of curiosity, Requiem made a circle around him with his blade with the same effect, but was greeted by a voice mix of male and female echoing throughout the chamber. “Please do not hurt my children. They just wish to…entice you.” The being the little girl spoke of materialized before him from the flesh below.
The creature was a male on its left side, and a female on the right. It had the genitals of both sexes with one inside the other. The head lacked a face all together except for a large blue eye that sat in the middle of its head. The skin of the being was a porcelain white that secreted a violet viscous from the top of its head, down its back and into the floor below where it blended with the room itself. It sent ripples from its head back down into the floor each time it spoke.
“You may refer to me as Master. No need to worry about names, old one.” Conveyed the being who stood before Requiem.
Waves ripped throughout the fleshy floor below until they made their way to the feet of Requiem. A lesser version of the being began to materialize at his feet. Half of a torso took form before him, stopping at his waist. It gazed up at him with a face of one of the poor lost souls it had already taken for its own. The body in front of Requiem caressed his crotch, but he did not take his eyes off the one in control of the domain.
The being before Requiem continued to speak with its voice echoing from every inch of the chamber. “Are you not aroused? Do you not crave the touch of a woman? Maybe a man?”
Requiem lifted his claymore that was resting at his side. He drove it down through the lesser being who was caressing him, and into the stone floor below. The lesser being dissolved back into the fleshy floor that created a circle around Requiem’s blade. With a twist of his sword, he crumbled the ground under his blade. Requiem turned his claymore with the flat side facing the humanoid creature.
“You disrespect Lust in its own domain? Do you not seek jo…” Requiem stepped in front of his claymore with his left foot, then used his right to help his blade throw the crumble stone below at Lust before it could finish speaking.
Lust’s body immediately lost shape, letting the eye in the middle of its head drop into the sludge below. Waves rippled in all directions, but the mass of one in particular caught Requiem’s attention. Requiem broke into a sprint to the large ripple heading to the closest wall with his blade at his side. He raised the claymore overhead predicting its next movement. Requiem then brought it down in front of the one called Lust to cut off its path, and that he did.
Requiem used all his might to kick up through the fleshy floor where the ripple had stopped before his blade. The eye of Lust was launched into many hands that reached out from the wall. Requiem followed up by gripping his blade with the hilt running along his forearm. He stepped forward dragging the blade through the sludge and ground to swing it in an upward motion. A lesser being materialized itself in between Requiem’s claymore and the eye of Lust to block the attack, but his blade stayed true.
His claymore passed right through its body that wore a face of passion and cut the eye in half. The fleshy borders of the chamber went limp before falling from the walls and ceiling onto the floor in chunks. The moans turned to screams making Requiem’s eardrums burst. Blood fell from under the sides of his iron mask as the joy of momentary silence fell upon him.