Darkest Dungeon Dames (Patreon)

Sex with monsters, cutting/scarring, mass breeding, sacrilege, crisis of faith, bloody fights, unspecified filth, and implied rape.

Dark and deep were the ancient tunnels, woven like a deeply-rooted rot beneath these lands. I used up the last of my men and torches before I found what was described in the ancient tomes. Through my veil of greed and madness, I made a pact with the lustful thing. What forbidden wisdom I had gained cost our village dearly, and the land that touched those tunnels were never the same again.

~an excerpt from the journal of my ancestors

Hura had little reason to trust her comrades. She was a woman of virtue and divinity, wielding the power of The Light to cleanse these blasted lands. They were clearly heathens, lunatics and criminals. The only reason she had to trust them was that the lands they went into were more savage than any of them and that they were being paid as well as she was to do so. The former owner of the local hamlet had left the land and wealth to his nephew, clearly a decent soul as he tried to rid the area of the ruin his ancestor left behind. It was why Hura was here. Clearly The Light led her here to find what corrupted these lands and burn away its dark heart beneath her holy wrath.

She was a solidly-built woman, bearing the femininity of a goddess and yet the wrathful might of an avenging angel. She wore the habit and robes of their priesthood, but they were worn and dirty from her long travels. She was a missionary, bringing guidance and judgement as this dark world needed. A small, silvery talisman of her vague deity hung at her hip, right next to the mace that had equal amount of use on her way. She had dark brown locks, long and peeking out from her hood past her tanned, bark-colored cheeks.

Ahead of her was Madam West, their "doctor." Clearly a fake name, as well as most of the things about her. She wore a full leather coat, cloak and hooded robe that covered a woman of clearly maternal curves. Complete with thick work gloves, goggles, and a beaked mask, it was surprising how much bosom the woman could show off while still maintaining a nearly air-tight seal around her body. Several belts and bags were stuffed with herbs, unmarked bottles, and very sharp knives that she wielded with equal enthusiasm. She had already tended to a shallow cut from some roaming bandits as easily as she had dispatched a rabid wolf.

Beyond her was Nadinia wearing her similarly veiling attire of a graverobber. A pick and shovel crossed on her back, with a wide-brimmed hat over her face. Straw-colored hair and a pale, smiling face peered out from beneath its shadow, clad in tight leathers and worn down clothes that spoke of a higher class than a petting thief. Even with the dust and dirt on her clothes, Hura felt she saw the signs of well-kept nails and faded but expensive lipstick beneath the consciously-smudged soot on her cheeks. The woman was clearly one of wealth, the sister believed, but not sure whether she fell from grace or if she obtained such luxury from these same grim means. Her eyes were veiled by her hat's shadow, but they could be seen darting swiftly one way or the other in search of danger and treasure.

In front of them all was Veron, the foreign hellion. While Hura doubted her the least in terms of skill and loyalty, she was still a disgusting and godless woman. Her dark red hair was pulled back in a few thick, dark dreads, and colored tattoos were on her pale skin and muscular arms. She always held a crude and brutal halberd in her hands, practically a butcher's knife with an enormous handle. The woman marched on with nothing more than a bit of leather across her breast and animal skins on her feet and hips. It was though the savage dared this deadly land to come and kill her, stomping through these woods quick and fearless. It seemed unmistakable with how she screeched and hurled herself forward in the face of battle.

"Right," Nadinia muttered as she held up the map to their torchlight. The trees grew thick here, so they swallowed what little sun there was left in the day. "We're turning left up at the old sign here." Veron turned to proceed as she directed, but Nadinia lashed out a hand. Quick as a viper, she caught the barbarian by her arm and halted her in mid-step.

"Carefully," she added firmly. She drew her shovel and reached out, flicking it at the air in front of them. It caught on a nearly unseen thread, giving a quick TWANG and THUNK as several barbed bits of shrapnel flew from a trap in the underbrush. "Hunters left their traps in this area, and I'm sure the bandits maintain them. You can't go fighting everywith with your blade, Veron." The graverobber grinned and started to move ahead of her, but Veron grabbed her by the shoulder. The jumpy thief looked ready for a punch in the face, but Veron just reached past her with her halberd. She prodded a thick red fungus the size of a child, letting it hiss and spray a noxious green spore into the air in front of them. When it had passed harmlessly, Veron snorted dismissively.

"And your spoiled eyes can't see everything, beggar." Veron stepped in front once again, and while Nadinia brushed herself off, Madam West chuckled jovially. The mast had a few narrow holes that somehow gave very little muffling or echo by means that none of them understood.

"I like this crew. This is going to be fun," West chirped, turning back to Hura. The frowning priestess thought she saw a wink behind those dark goggles, but she clearly picked up her step. She only slowed to open up a beaker, scoop up some of the giant mushroom's spores, and tuck them away for later.

They reached the mouth of the tunnel, marked by many bones and signs of activity. "More wolves, do you think?" Nadinia proposed as she examined the site but didn't dare get closer just yet.

"Something darker," Hura spoke up. She drew her mace and stepped forward. "This place is cursed and tainted."

"You say that about everywhere we've been," Madam West pointed out.

"This is especially thick with wickedness. It must be the source." Hura held up her mace until the thick, studded head glowed. "And where there is wickedness, The Light will tear it out by the roots."

The glow of her weapon grew brighter and stronger as she started to chant in ancient tongues. The mace seemed to thrum with a dull noise until the bones started to move. The skeletons clattered as they went to their feet, seizing their dull and rusty weapons as they recoiled from the sight but stood ready to fight rather than ambush. "The Light finds your sins, cursed monster!" Hura shouted, swinging her mace at the air. It gave a thunderous boom as one of the skeletons was blasted in half.

While Nadinia and West readied their equipment, Veron flung herself into the fray. The reluctant skeletons were easily caught off guard as she left a deep slice through one's skull and sent another's shield flying from the force of her thrust. "You'll all die twice before you take me once, ya mightless fucks!" she roared, grinning and swinging hard enough that spittle flew from her lips.

The undead things started to mount an offensive of their own, but a pair of daggers flew through the air. They buried into both of one's eye sockets, knocking the skull clean off and making it crumble to the the ground. Nadinia drew another pair of knives between her fingers while raising her shovel like a pickaxe, whistling musically as she thrust her shovel straight past Hura and through one's spine. "You get this sometimes with skellies," the thief joked. "Improper burials or cursed grounds can do that. Not so bad when you've got someone watching your back."

There was a sizzling sound as she whirled and saw another skeleton howling and clawing at its face. Bright green liquids seared through its skin, withering it into nothing but sludge and dust. Madam West waved to them, another beaker of the awful stuff in her hand and at the ready. She hurled the makeshift acid grenade over their shoulders to splash in between the main pack of the walking dead. "Right through the bone! Did you see that?!" she chimed. "Such research. Such fun!"

Another pair of them burst from the forest, apparently left further than the rest of the corpses. The let out raspy hisses as they grabbed for West, the screaming plague doctor shoving a gloved hand into its face and jabbing wildly with a bloodletting knife.

"They're on me!" she shouted, thrashing and shoving until one went flying back. Its flailing grazed Nadinia's leg, slicing open her pants as she yelped and hurried to smash its skull in with her pick. The other kept clawing at Madam West, tearing at her layered clothes until a glove and some of the wraps around her chest went tumbling off.

Veron let out a begrudging snarl as she turned back around. She hated to be taken from the heat of battle just to rescue the masked woman, but she leapt over one of the killed-again corpses and thrust her blade through its chest, sending ribs flying.

Hura went on swinging her mace to smash another of the monster with a burst of light. They had seemed nearly finished when another leapt from behind the tunnel. Some of its old, leathery skin still stuck to its face and rotten teeth as it seized her and bit into her arm. "OH ALL THE LIGHT'S BASTARDS!" the warrior nun shouted, trying to pull away. When it remained firmly latched onto her, she smashed at it wildly with her glowing mace. It drove its teeth in deeper throughout the beating, but she hammered away until its skull was powder.

The group was breathing heavily after all of that, but largely unhurt. Madam West hurried to get spare clothes around her hands and jiggling chest while Hura cast some simple healing over her bite. When the flesh was healed, her muttered a small prayer and drew her old whittling knife. She pulled down the top of her robe, exposing her breast to the open air as she dragged her blade just beneath her skin. No more cursing. No more sin. May The Light forgive her weak flesh and unworthy soul. Whatever her sisters had told her, she knew there was sin in her and only blood would let it out.

"Is this all they have to bring to me?" Veron boasted, kicking the nearest skull off into the woods. "The spirits would never forgive me to know that old bones were my most dangerous opponent."

"Then your devilish spirits should be pleased by whatever we find down there," Hura muttered. She took the torch and waved her mace over it, refreshing its flame as she gestured towards the tunnel. "Are you all prepared to enter?"

"Just so long as goggles doesn't throw any more skeletons on me," Nadinia huffed.

"You would have done the same, you little rat!" Madam West objected as she tightened a small belt over her wrists to maintain the seal. "If I die, all of my research goes with me. You would not believe the kinds of diseases and creatures I've found just by getting here! Imagine what's inside!"

"Jewels and baubles," Nadinia purred as she turned and ignored the rambling medic. "Things lost that gleam in the dark. I'm ready as can be."

The tunnels were stranger and darker than they expected. They were big enough to walk upright, but tight enough to feel claustrophobic. Veron turned a corner and recoiled as a twisted face met her. She screamed in instant fury and rammed her spear through it, only for it to shatter apart into pieces on the ground. The others jumped and looked for what had happened, but Nadinia just bent down and picked up a piece. It was a bust of a humanoid face, its mouth wide and eyes empty in a mask of horror.

"Just a scarecrow," she assured them, tossing it back aside. "Or an old totem. Remind you of anything from home there, Veron?"

"No," she growled tersely. "Keep moving. If anything heard that, then we want to be where they least expect us."

"What all made this, anyway?" West mused as she ran a gloved hand along the dirt walls. Occasional beams or walls of stone and brick marked odd locations.

"Looks like men's tools," Nadinia offered as she lit a small lantern to see a bit clearer and hung it on her belt. "Maybe vermin took them over when some miners left, except that this doesn't look like a proper mine."

Hura frowned and paused as she looked at one of the crude pillars. "And there are markings. They were doing something very purposeful here..." she mused. She didn't recognize the language, but strange characters were carved into the pillar with something rough and sharp. Simple pictograms showed something going in and coming out of a spherical shape. They started to hurt her eyes the more she looked at it, so she moved to keep up with the others.

It was shortly after that the voices started. They were just barely voices, though. They had hints of words to them, but always through grunts and squeals, as if they were trying to be heard over a herd of pigs. Veron stopped and braced herself, her polearm ahead as she looked around the tight space. "Do you all hear that?" she demanded.

"Why would we not hear that?" Madam West hissed quietly. "Do you think we deal with your imaginary gods and spirits? YES, I hear it! Where are they?"

"Can't tell," the barbarian reported. "Too many pathways. Too many echoes."

"Here. Let me." Nadinia stepped forward and drew her dagger. She held it against the wall, first in one spot and then another and another. They held their breath until she gestured down one of the tunnels. "They're this way."

Somehow, none of them asked why they went towards them. They knew their job: find what was corrupting this land and exterminate it at any cost. Nadinia stopped once or twice to check the vibrations with her knife before moving on, and the women finally stopped and stared in horror at the source.

Beastmen sat around a table, tearing at the corpse of something humanoid. While the meal appeared at a glance, the twisted things raised many doubts into many things. They were all roughly half pig, primarily in the facial features. Their lack of consistency threw the women off, as some bore human or pig noses at random. Some bore stunted arms or hooved feet, all squealing in their illegible language. The women could only stare for so long before one of them looked out and pointed a carving knife at them. It blurted out an order and all of the naked mutants grabbed nearby weapons and rose.

"No! Nooo I did not sign up for THIS!" Nadinia frantically hurled a knife, which one of the mutants blocked at it raised a pot lid as a shield. The thief shoved her way back behind the other women while Veron and West stepped forward. The barbarian swung her bladed weapon to smash into the hand-axe of the burliest beast. The flabby beast roared at her, its misshapen body and drooping genitals wobbled. Veron looked into its beady black eyes and roared back into its face as she bared her teeth. This rattled even the beastman was she spun and whipped her halberd in a huge arc that ripped open its fat stomach.

Madam West had drawn a pair of large scalpels, walking with a calm that puzzled anyone looking. "My my! I'll never find specimen like this anywhere else," she noted merrily. A few of the smaller ones went for her, but she darted aside and shoved one short blade into its neck. It squealed and went down as the other two came at her. She drove her knife into one's eye, but it was charging too quickly and let its corpse tumble on top of her. She was pinned as the second came at her with a chipped sword, left wriggling under the persistently pinning pig.

"Hura! Hura, help them!" Despite her shouts, Nadinia had bolted behind the priestess and gripped her pickaxe like a holy symbol.

The priestess finally shook off the shock, finding herself in a cold sweat in the face of the attacking mutants. "Yes! I'm sorry. Light forgive me, oh holy and sacred..." She drew her mace as it flared to life, its divine glow seeming to flicker as one with a shield and hammer approached.

"Stay calm, girl. Think of the gold," Nadinia muttered, seemingly to herself as she wrung her pick anxiously. Hura thrust out her mace with a loud shout, but the monster barely faltered as the shockwave hit it. Hura's eyes widened as her fear got in the way of her divine magic and the hobbling pigman raised its hammer. She clearly saw that her deity showed no favor for cowards, so she swung the mace itself. It cracked the boar-faced thing across the jaw, breaking one of its tusks in a spurt of blood. It shorted its grip on the hammer to bash it into Hura's ribs, getting her to howl in pain as she fell to her knees. She gave another desperate swing that knocked its hammer away, but the pig bashed its shield across her face like a brutal slap. She slumped against a wall, trying to raise her mace clumsily when it grabbed her wrist and pinned her to the wall.

Everything felt horrible in that moment. Hura felt like she was about to die in the worst way possible. Dirt and stone crumbled over her hooded head. The monster clutched the weapon in her hand. Its muscled and naked body pressed against her, its strong-smelling phallus in her face. She felt ready to wretch as the thick rod of flesh and twisted but muscular stomach pulsed with its raspy breaths. "No," he mewled as her eyes went vacant. "No. No. Not again. Light spare me, but not this again..."

A long knife popped out of the thing's belly, just short of her face. She started and shuffled back as the creature let go of her arm, slumping into the dirt as Nadinia let the dagger go to vanish into its back. "Stupid churchfolk," she hissed. "You owe me another knife." She drew her shovel and ran off after West and her struggling battle, even as the terror-induced sweat made every piece of clothing cling to her like a second skin. A baseball swing with her shovel sent some chunks of bone and brain flying from the pinning monster’s head.

Veron had taken to standing on their dining table for high ground, impaling one of their snouted skulls before kicking their brutal meal onto one of the shorter ones. "Your blood just makes me hunger for more!" she boomed, whirling so that the butt of her weapon crunched one in the mouth and knocked out a few thick teeth. One finally caught her by the leg, hooking a dull meathook around her and pulling. Veron let out a loud grunt as she landed crotch-first on the edge of the table, bouncing off at a miserable angle. The remaining two started to pile onto her, the bigger one sniffing her curiously and running a thick, slimy tongue over her face. She shuddered and tried to blink away the tears and pain as she wiped at the sticky saliva, but the other stomped on her wrist to pin her arm.

Veron screamed from the pain, but as the creature opened its mouth wider, she lunged in and bit it in the throat. The bigger pigman squealed and recoiled, and while its skin was tough and leathery, its movement just made it easier for Veron to rip out a piece of its neck with her teeth. It dropped its butcher knife, which Veron immediately grabbed and buried in its partner's chest. When it too screeched and pulled back, she reclaimed her spear and rose. "Dong huoght, squeea!" it gargled at her with a raised hand, but the savage redhead just ran her spear through its pelvis hard enough that it went up to her handhold. She whipped her arm away and let it quickly bleed to death nearby as it was flung off.

“Search the place. See if they have anything that’s not rotted through or too filthy to use,” the redhead ordered. 

“Got to be something,” Nadinia muttered as she wiped some chunks of hog flesh on her vest. “We didn’t go through all that for nothing.” The thief went to work turning over the bodies with her shovel and carefully rooting through some crude crates. 

Hura finally started to pull herself together. “What kind of damned things are they?” She prodded one with her mace, but shuddered and shifted back when its glassy eyes seemed to stare at her.

“Who cares?” Veron snorted. She picked up the meat hook from one of the beastman’s hands, testing it with a swing before throwing it away and rooting through the others. “They look like pigs, they die like pigs.”

“What sort of thing would cause all that though?” Madam West mused, walking over to the biggest one that Veron had done the favor of gutting for her. She tugged her gloves on tighter and started to look them over as a coroner. She was far less concerned with dead bodies, given her experience and layers of protection. “Filthy little things, whatever they are… do you suppose they’re the products of magic? Or some new breed of animal?”

“Magic be damned,” Nadinia laughed, trying to brush off her nervousness. “I bet they’re a product of the old-fashioned way.” She made a circle with one hand and pumped her finger inside the hole with a wicked grin.

“You are disgusting,” Hura sneered, turning quickly away from the hogs before she started letting her imagination go. The image still haunted her, so she brought out her knife and made a fresh mark on her breast to steady herself.

The group came up with some minor loot and supplies: useable torches, some assorted gems, and some clean enough rags to use for bandages. Madam West had dissected a couple of them for an investigation, finding a concerning mix of both human and pig anatomy (and all of them male). “There’s almost no consistency between them, even internal. There’s not any particularly outside influences or illnesses I can find beyond their general filth and cannibalism. Odds are they’re massively inbred and mutated by the process.”

What really stood out was the book. There’s was a crusty old pocket notebook that Nadinia had found inside a rusty chest by some moldy clothes. She thumbed through, to find it in some stiff and strange language. “They’re writing… that’s not concerning,” the grave robber muttered as she clapped it shut. “Looks like a lot of gibberish though. Probably not smart enough to actually write… right?” 

Veron growled from her perch sitting on their dining table, sharpening and cleaning off her weapon. “Who cares? You wouldn’t kill them if they COULD write?” She decided not to mention that one of them had spoken in broken English at her, if they were already so concerned. 

“Any knowledge is useful.” Madam West held out a gloved hand, smudging some blood off her goggles as she thumbed through. “Well it’s not exactly perfect, but I’m seeing some some Grucian in here. It was often used by sailors, so it was more of a trade language. I only know a couple words of it myself from an old teacher.”

“Somehow, I don’t believe a woman like you went to medical school,” Nadinia scoffed. West tilted her head enough to show a smirk under her mask. Hura sighed and took it from the plague doctor’s hands.

“I should know enough of it. Let me see.” Veron groaned as the priestess started skimming over it, her face growing pale. “They’re human… no, there were humans here. This is dated far back at least a generation, but… they take humans and use them to breed them the rest of their lives. They mention here… ‘We were given our new fertility goddess. The last one we pushed too hard, only…’ I think it says ‘twenty spawned. We stuff her full of food and cum until she’s ready to burst, and… treat her how she wishes?” Hura’s voice quivered as she stiffened her posture. “She begs for more, her mind truly like one of us. Truly happy, our goddess of birth. She...”

Veron grabbed the book from her shaking hands, leaving the priestess to wipe her sweaty hands on her robes. “We get it. Don’t get caught. Wasn’t part of my plans anyway.” She threw it to the mud and nodded off down the other side of the tunnels. “We go now. If we stay here trembling at what they are, they’ll wonder where their dead are. So unless you want some of the food they left behind, then move.”

Nadinia gave a sour look at the butchered and dirty body of what could have been a human being, but the pigmen made her question that. “You know what? I think some fresh air and movement would do us good.” She gave the map a quick check and fixed her hat before starting off with Veron to lead the way. Hura hesitated before picking up the journal when it seemed no one was looking. It was hard to tell if Madam West saw from behind her mask and goggles, but she didn’t say anything if she did.

“Light forgive me for such thoughts and visions,” the warrior nun muttered as she rubbed a hand between her thighs.

There were a few more of the beasts, but they were more easily managed this time and in smaller numbers. Nadinia had slit a scout’s throat before it knew they were there, and a smoke bomb from Madam West made Hura and Veron obliterate another pair of brutes. Nadinia or West always patted them down for loot before dragging them off into a shadow to minimize their chances of being caught. They had lost all real track of time down in the depths, so it was only when they got hungry and worn out from the hiking that they set up camp. They found a dead-end tunnel to tuck themselves into, Hura starting up a fire while the others unpacked their supplies.

“Who wants rations!?” Nadinia chimed as she held up the dense and crumbly goods. “Which do you want? The one without flavor or the one that chip your teeth?”

“I have some meat from the road,” Veron explained as she pulled some out to set over the fire. “I’ll make my own and scout the area.”

“Rrrright. That wouldn’t be pork there, would it?” Veron glared up at the thief, who pulled the hat off her eyes and turned away with her rations, passing it off the others. Hura set some water over her rations to soften them up while Madam West went into her softer, plainer stuff. Camp was the only time they really saw her without all her gear on. When she ate and slept, it came off to show a woman with a missing tooth and a sunken face that might have been a lovely young woman once, having worked herself ragged into what she was now. White hairs outnumbered the black from beneath her cowl, and crumbs trickled over the huge breasts that poked up through her robe. 

“Don’t know what people complain about,” West insisted as she licked her fingers and broke off another chunk of rations. For how meticulous she was with her tools and layered armor, she certainly was a sloppy eater with little care for manners or short-term cleanliness. “Of course, I’ve smelled so much ammonia and herbs in my days that I can hardly smell or taste. Lucky trait in this line of work, eh?” 

Her gap-toothed grin put Nadinia on pins and needles. The woman must have worn her mask so long she forgot how to smile, or saw so few of them that she had to read how to do one from a book. Shame on such a jolly and busty old cow. 

By the time Veron finished with her meat, Madam West went to scout with her. Her curiosity had the better of her, and she’d decided that the more she knew about the things the better. She replaced her mask and chattered about all that she’d learned about the pigmen. 

Veron sighed as she shifted her grip on her weapon. “You really are a cracked, old woman, but at least you have the courage to face these things. I thought the thief was ready to run her way back to town, and the holy woman is clearly broken just from one encounter with the beasts.”

“Yes, well, these things can be strange when you haven’t been wrist-deep in entrails, eh?” Madam West chimed. “Can’t blame them for being a bit afraid of all… this.”

“I don’t think the sister is afraid,” Veron said grimly. “I think she’s finding too much comfort in this sickening place.”

West gave a hesitant "Huh," of dismissal as they went along. Veron kept spotting tracks or picking up noise, marking these areas subtly for later. The plague doctor dawdled just behind her, taking note of any signs of the pigmen's lives. Small tables of candles or carts of half-eaten fruit caught her eye, piecing together that the things were barely bright enough to breed and eat. Even the tunnels bore no visible markings, and Veron picked up no strange scents, so they likely operated strictly by memory. The fact that she found one starved carcass of such a beast indicated that wasn't their strong suit.

It was deeper in when they found the trap door. West had adjusted her lenses to pick up any light they could, and a strange gleam got her attention. She found a narrow crack in the walls with a light sourceand when Veron helped her pull away a false wall and some loose boards, they saw what looked to be a tiny shrine. A small cave held a low stone pedastal held up an odd statue. It resembled a rising tentacle and was made of a glossy black stone. A beam of moonlight poured over it, making its darkness act like a source of light among the dull brown and red of dirt and torchlight.

"Interesting," West said, grunting as she pushed away the last of the wall. "Must be of value to somebody. I do wonder what it's made of..."

She started to shuffle closer, eyes fixed on their prize when Veron shouldered past her. "More prize to make this trip worth all this work," she said with a grim grin. Her boot hit the piece of loose dirt, letting her foot fall right onto the trap. She jerked back in surprise, but not before one of the rusty blades inside the trapdoor sliced her up the ankle.

Veron opened her mouth wide to scream when a thick glove went over her mouth. She thrashed and still tried to bite and bellow some sort of blaspheme when she felt metal on her neck. "Veron, it's me," Madam West said softly, her beaked mask poking past her shoulder. "You are trying to scream in an echoing chamber deep within enemy territory. We don't know what was on those spikes. I am going to have to inspect you to see you're not bleeding or poisoned, but you're going to have to keep from yelling or I will slit your throat on the spot to get out of here unfound."

Veron's eyes went wide and she considered biting the mad woman's finger off. She growled something through the thick leather glove, but it squeezed her face tighter. "Do you understand? Blink twice if you understand." Veron obeyed.

"There's a good girl." She patted Veron on the cheek, releasing the barbarian to spit on the dirt. The leather tasted of chemicals and foul blood. Madam West went to work, removing the boot and lifting Veron's loincloth to assess the damage while the redhead watched the entrance with her spear raised. There was the occasion, implacable noise of the swine, but no one entered. West simple muttered about what lovely skin she had, but had her washed and bandaged quickly.

"There. Good as new." She dug into her pouch again, producing some gleaming dust and blowing it ahead. Seeming satisfied that there was nothing else to worry about, West picked up the tentacle totem and returned as Veron pushed herself back to her feet. "A nice little piece, too. It must be in the sunlight all day... it feels... warm. A small comfort in this mucky place."

Veron sneered and darted her head at the door. "Keep it. I'd rather not carry what cost me blood. It's an unworthy trophy."

"Suit yourself!" Madam West tucked the tentacle statue down the front of her robes, adjusting her bouncing breasts with a giggle. "A fascinating little treasure. Something to keep me warm at night."

At the camp, Nadinia stoked the fire and watched as Hura thumbed slowly through the journal. "You doing okay, sister?"

"Hm?"

"I know you holy types can get pretty obsessed with your books," the stringy-haired thief grinned. "But maybe leave the pigs and their crazy talk alone?"

"I'm sorry," Hura said with a nod, closing the book sharply. "I thought that the knowledge would be useful, however blasphemous and... visceral."

"Listen, I get it. There's a difference between seeing the world and knowing it. The church of The Light likes to keep its folks, ironically, in the dark on this temptation stuff." The thief reached over and pat her on the thigh. "If you need a hand some time, let me know. I've been known to spend some nights in the brothel, sampling the flavors of the world. And if I'm not your type, I've got some novels that kept me busy in my lonesome teenage nights."

"Thank you," Hura said sternly, regaining her uptight frown. "But I will be fine. I am stronger than temptations of the flesh."

Nadinia smiled with teeth too perfect to belong to a sleazy gravedigger. At least Hura was being self-righteous instead of shaken. "Only problem with that is flesh is what you're made of. You step too far away from it and you'll rip yourself apart."

The scouts returned by that point, tossing in what firewood and bits of treasure they had found. The hogs didn't seem to value coin and gems as anything more than eye-catching shinies, so they weren't good at guarding them. They settled in for the night, taking their shifts on watch.

Veron offered first and last shift. The pain in her leg was fading, but after listening to Madam West's hissed threats, she didn't want to sleep around her just yet. She kept imagining the masked woman drugging her and carving off her clothes before exploring her like another cadaver. She kept her eyes on the entrance while tossing bits of bone into the campfire: one for each of them, accompanied by a quick chant to the spirits and her ancestors as she let her heart race, imagining killing the pigs by the hundreds to keep her mind and blade sharp.

Nadinia took the second shift, an uneventful period where she sorted out the loot and double checked her map for the fastest way out of there at any time. She prodded the masked doctor awake next, who thanked her and took a quick swig of some beaker before she went to watch.

Hura woke up on her own for the fourth watch. There was an oddly rapid breathing, but Madam West had not come for her. She sat up and saw the woman squatting by the entrance to their camp, her robe pulled aside and masturbating. She was pumping the spiraling tentacle statue inside herself, gasping and grunting softly. The statue glistened even more with her flowing juices that ran down its detailed tendril, a thick palm-sized base seeming to make it a perfect grip. Her mask was off, showing her gaping mouth as she huffed for air as her wide hips (quite unlike her thin and weary face) bounced up and down on her new treasure.

"West? West!" Hura hissed at her. At first she thought she hadn't heard her in the throes of her masturbation, but she muttered back.

"Almost... nearly there. YYYYYESS!" Madam West held up a finger for Hura to wait so she could finish. She pulled her mask back over her face, making a strange sight as the busty, robed figure clutched the beaked make to her face and shook with pleasure. She groped her big chest with one hand while the other held her mask, leaving her lower body to simply slam her heavy hips onto the twisted phallus. She was apparently stealthy enough to avoid waking up any of the other women. Her labored breathing came through the mask as she fixed her clothes, tucking a big pale breast back inside her.

"Sorry about that. I thought I'd let you sleep in a bit while I... watched." The doctor buttoned up the last of her curvy body before Hura could bring herself to look right at her.

"What on earth was that?" Hura asked, looking at the radiantly soaked tentacle statue.

"Oh, just something I found around. I gave it a polish, and kept noting how warm it was to the touch. That and... well, it's been a while. Almost felt like the real thing, too." The weathered woman took her mask back off once she was done panting, shaking out her dusty hair. "If you want to borrow it, I can have it disinfected. Not that I've got any diseases, mind. Just being polite."

"No... thank you," Hura said warily. She supposed with a body like that, it wasn't surprising that Madam West had a sex life outside of her work. Then again, folks told strange stories about the plague doctors. How most of them were unlicensed and were the only ones willing to go into diseased and dangerous lands for whatever suicidal reason. Hura decided not to ask about it when the thoughts of her career and a love life didn't add up to anything pleasant. "I'll just keep myself busy."

"Suit yourself." Madam West raised and kissed the totem before she went off to bed, tucking it back into her bosom. She was always eccentric, but this was something new. It lingered on Hura's mind, remembering the humping woman and her plump figure in motion spilling out of her robe. She remembered the details of the journal; someone enslaved by the monsters until she seemed to adore their attention. How she birthed dozens of the mutants just to be filled up by more, forced to pleasure the stinking abominations as they squealed and drooled over her. They worshipped her as they used her body, and they said she was happy. The one had even tried to beg for mercy at the end of their battle, so they weren't entirely mindless, only savage. The Light did not teach them to suffer monsters, but if she was too powerless to stop them from pervading her sacred body... overpowering her blessed chastity and forcing her to give in too her sinful urges...

Hura kept her back to the group as she slid a hand beneath her robes. The air still smelled of sex from Madam West's presence. How could they not all smell it? It was invading her body, filling her lungs with the sinful musk. It whipped on the thoughts of the molesting monsters and the horrible, carnal bliss that would follow such an act of weakness. She touched between her legs for the first time in years, apart from bathing, moaning and spreading her thighs farther apart. She remembered the sweat and drool of the monsters that had nearly overcome her. Felt their rancid bodies press against her, their primal ways trying to make her into their next fertile goddess. The sacrilegious perversion soon had her fingering faster while her other hand took out her knife.

"Great and shining Light, forgive me," she whimpered, tracing another shallow red line along her breast. "I am but flesh. Your radiance is all that keeps me apart from these disgusting things. Please guide me from this mind of sin and should my heart turn to darkness, tear it from me that I may shine with you! You..." She cringed and squeezed tears from her eyes as she delivered another line of masochistic punishment for enjoying herself too much. She wasn't like the other priests, who indulged in drink or crude humor, who distracted their love for The Light between a wife or children. She was his one true chosen. She was supposed to be above these urges. She felt her fingers brush her clitoris, the largely untouched bud swollen and eager for attention. She pinched at it hard to try to stop herself, but it was only making it worse. "Light, you are my only pleasure! Help me find... uhnnn... release... from these wicked waaaAAAYYS!"

She finally came, shaking and sobbing as she held herself tightly. She hurried to get a cloth and clean up her mess. She fretted and whispered apologetic prayers for enjoying herself too much, but for all her panic, things began to come clear once again. She wouldn't credit it to the release of her orgasm, only that she had overcome the carnal urges through her chants and focus. The party woke up, no appetite or grasp of time to make them want breakfast. Hura wondered if any of them could smell or spot what she'd done the night before, but no one said a word. They seemed to have their own problems to deal with.

They weren't sure how the pigs knew to expect them, but the ambush hit them all the same. After a short hour of searching, they heard the grunts and squeals coming from the tunnel ahead of them. Veron braced herself for the attack, but they hadn't expected that the things could outmaneuver them and strike from behind.

Nadinia let out a scream as a pair of tall, skinny hogs grabbed her from behind. Madam West turned towards her just as a larger brute barreled down the side hall and rammed into her, crushing her against the dirt wall. Nadinia screamed and flailed with her dagger on the ground while West had begun stabbing rapidly with her one free hand around the attacking thing's kidneys.

"What are they doing back there?!" Veron shouted as a half dozen hogs charged them head on. She slashed down the first, cleaving its face and snout open just for a bigger one to trample it and grab her dreads. The barbarian twisted and rammed her halberd up through its chin, only for the monster to fall over backward with it buried in its skull. The valiantly punched the third, but they quickly swarmed over her.

"I will wear your eyes and balls as earrings, you powerless scum!" she roared as Hura sent bolts of light over her shoulders, blinding and stunning the creatures as best she could. A gnarled fist struck the berserker across the face, bouncing her skull off of the densely packed dirt of the wall. It dazed her long enough for another to bash a spiked mace into her upper arm, making Veron howl in a noise warped by agony and fury.

"Please, please, help," Hura hissed through her teeth, turning and sending a broad flash of light towards Nadinia and her attackers. They had torn open her vest and robbed her of her knife and shovel, leaving several ugly bruises on her face and arms. Her pack laid on the ground from the tussle, kicking and screaming and making herself as difficult a target as possible.

"Stop it! Stop it, you inbred, animal farm freaks!" Nadinia shrieked when she noticed her one arm freed as a hog shielded his eyes from the divine light. She grabbed up her pick and swung it upward into the other pig's misshapen groin. It naturally collapsed in pain as Nadinia crawled past it... and fled.

"Thanks, Hura. I won't forget you!" she called as she ran back the way they came. The priestess stared after her for a moment, left utterly stunned.

"You... you traitor! You'll burn for this!" she shouted after her as the blinking pigs spotted her next. The big one on West was bleeding badly from its side, but it clubbed the masked woman across the face with its big dull axe. Hura could hear the grim, meaty sound of its impact as Madam West went limp, the damage unclear with all of her gear on but with some blood trickling down under her mask.

Veron was swinging wildly with fists and knees as fast as she could, but she was badly bleeding, and she wasn't using one of her limply hanging arms nearly as much. The two tall ones went for Hura as she felt their wrinkled, clammy claws grab her by the arms. That was it. There was no hope left. She did all she could think.

"I wish to be a goddess!" she shouted. The pigs stopped their attacks, at least those that could afford to. Veron was held against the ground by her throat now, but she still kicked uselessly at a thug's tree trunk legs and biting his fleshy fingers. She thought back and recited it in the same tradespeak from the journal. There was some low snorting between them until one of the talls let out another of its clumsy words. "Tuva Queg!" it barked. They firmly led Hura along, letting her stand but not releasing her arms. The big bloody one dragged Madam West by the hood, shoving away a few of her bags to lighten the load. When Veron was clearly not cooperating, one stomped a hoof on her face and knocked her out cold before they dragged her by the feet behind them, dreads trailing in the dirt.

The three remaining women were brought to the largest chamber in the entire tunnel complex. A low pit was in the middle where a few of the bigger hogs were matching fists and tusks in some kind of violent duel. Dozens more surrounded the pit, shouting and squealing at the competitors before they looked over at the newcomers. Racks of weapons and supplies were here and there, but their queen stood out the most. An ancient throne of rotting wood sat a few yards away from the fighting pit, a grotesquely bloated human woman sitting atop it. She didn't wear a scrap of clothing, only muck and discolored skin. She smiled widely with missing teeth, clumps of hair missing from her head besides a few long and filthy clumps of hair.

"My children! By the ancestor's spirits, you bring us more sows!" she praised in a raspy voice that only furthered the idea of how disgusting and diseased the jolly woman was. Her choice of words made the faded blue markings on her face stand out, and Hura held her breath. She bowed deeply and was glad that Veron was out cold or else...

"Traitorous whore! Stinking pig-fucking filth! Devils chew your bones and drink your fat!" The barbarian shouted as she began to thrash again. Hura saw the insults flung at the woman, apparently some member of Veron's own clan some time ago, but the words still stung her own ears in both volume and content. She knew her cowardice would damn her. Her body still got goosebumps where the filthy things touched her with their hands or dangling shafts. She'd be turned into something like their queen sow soon.

Veron would take no such thing. She sat upright and stabbed one of the knives from her furs into a big hog's leg. It shrieked and collapsed, but the rest of the swine swarmed her to hold her down. While she had no idea when, Madam West had apparently woken up somewhere in the process and took that opportunity to strike. She took the flask on her hip and threw it into the nearest monster's face, leaving it shrieking and clutching the melting skin and exposing skull. She ran for one of the tunnels when a shorter one tackled her around the knees, its stubby tusks biting at her ass and thighs as she went down.

"Such wild things, our sows! They remind me of myself a time ago. Too bad we have so many..." Their flabby goddess with her bulging belly sneered with her diseased mouth at them. She looked right to the quiet Hura, which made her shudder with at least as much corrupted lust as there was disgust. "You though. You accept your fate. You knew your destiny when you came here..."

The queen patted her belly. It jiggled and she felt like she saw shapes and faces through the flesh, something that would have revolted Hura in the past. She simply swallowed and sweat. "I do... now."

"HURA! YOU GOD-PHELLATING COWARD!" Veron roared loud enough to spray flecks of blood from her throat and lips, startling some of the hogs into jumping in surprise. It freed a hand enough for the savage to grab and bite off two of one's fingers before they could beat her into submission with more clubs.

"Good," the queen went on casually. "I felt it too. A kinship with these, my children and brothers. I knew they would care for me if I was gentle." She grinned and sat upright, seemingly too enormous with their hideous kin to stand up on her stocky legs. "And one of the temples, if I'm not mistaken. I think you'll find living as a goddess shines much brighter than your pathetic Light does down here."

"What of my companions?" Hura asked meekly, looking down at her shoes. The queen gestured and the pigs started to grab at her, quickly clawing off her clothes as she bit her lip and let them. It felt... right. Like it twisted so far into wrong that it wormed its way back again. A part of her relished their filthy touch in a way she would never forget.

"We don't normally catch so many of you. My kin were surprisingly delicate with you all," she said despite the bleeding in Veron's arm growing worse.

"If I may... since they wish to fight so much, lend them your pit. Let one die for your children to feast on and the strong one may leave. They will bring more strong young back to us some day when they seek revenge."

"Hura, I swear I will eat the heart of your precious Light when I am..." Veron gurgled through grit teeth and bleeding lips.

"Sounds good to me," Madam West piped up quickly. Veron glared at the woman, but her cracked goggles betrayed no sort of insight on her expression. "I think I can beat her now that she has one arm."

Hura looked to the queen expectantly. It sounded like something the godless savages would do. The Swine Queen gestured at the pit jovially. "Of course. It will please your goddess and feed your young, my boys!" The hogs squealed in delight, finally leaving Hura in nothing but a loincloth. She shuddered and hugged herself, feeling the grime from their unwashed touch between her hands and shoulders. Her occasional scar from past dangers provided minor bumps on her skin, and the pigs stared at her between moments in the action to come as they awaited the chance to break in their new leader.

The two women were robbed of their weapons and dumped unceremoniously into the pit, splattering into the mud. They went clumsily to their feet, neither woman likely to last long. Hura couldn't tell who was worse off, between West's armor and covered wounds or Veron's mindless adrenaline surges. As they readied themselves, West reached deeper into her coat and drew out another curved scalpel.

"You're as low as the rest of them," the barbarian spat as she raised her fists and bared her teeth.

"At least I gave your proper warning last night," West said with a shrug. "If it means I get out, I'll be sure to tell your bloodline... should I ever meet them. Or know what they look like."

"Don't bother," Veron growled. She charged when West seemed to hesitate, catching her offguard with a punch to the belly. The woman stumbled, but caught onto her arm and thrust her scalpel into Veron's stomach with a precision strike. The barbarian gasped wetly, clutching her belly and backing away. West calmly shook the blood off her tool.

"Doctors must know their way around their organs," she replied in that strange chipper tone. Veron stared back at her, the fury breaking for a moment as she saw a playful wink from the lunatic doctor. She shook her head and pounced at her with a roar.

Hura watched and couldn't stop shaking. It was wrong. It was the worst way she could imagine going, slowly raped to her death by these creatures, but a part of her demanded that she enjoy it. That she deserved this for all her weakness and failure. That all the abuse and pain she had suffered in the past was her fault. She bit her lip and looked down at the half dozen slashes she'd left on her left breast, tallying her recent sins.

It was not her fault. She was the hand of The Light that would fix what was wrong with the world, not simply endure it. She could only hope this worked. If everyone knew what they were doing, then they had a chance.

Veron kept tackling and punching Madam West, but she struck surely with her blade while dodging away. It seemed to be a close match as both bled and bruised each other. While they went for the occasional killing blow, they always fell short and earned disappointed groans and hurling of filth from the hogs observing them. The queen relished the show as Veron struck Madam West around the belly and breast, the most padded parts of her body. West was glad that she had gotten the message when she'd started to jab into bits of muscle rather than vital organs, missing anything truly important with truly surgical skill. Ever since she had spotted Nadinia from gleam of her blade catching off her goggles, she'd hoped this was what Hura had in mind.

The gravedigger had salvaged the packs from their battleground, rearming herself with the goods that the pigs had been too stupid to value. The party was easy to track from here, once she had changed into clean pants and had some time to think about it. She robbed the dead, but she wasn't sure she'd be able to sleep at night with those voices and images of her dying, raped comrades in her head.

Nadinia moved as quietly as if she were raiding a crypt under a gravedigger's nose. She kept her pick in one hand while the other gripped her sharpest knife, slitting a throat whenever one stepped or was shoved back from the crowd. She had them thinned down to about thirty, still too much for a clean break. She couldn't pick them all off, so she dug into her emergency supply... which was to say Madam West's bag.

"Coward coming through!" she shouted, hurling a pair of flasks skillfully with each hand. Several of the hogs burned to flame or acid while an acrid green smog flooded that half of the arena. She hurled a few knives into the crowd before bolting forward. She went right for what she thought to be the most important tool right now: Veron's spear. She threw the hefty thing into the pit, where Veron quickly boosted West out and ran up the wall with her halberd as a lever to balance off the mud.

"You scheming piece of shit!" Veron laughed as she whirled and cut down two pigs in one swing.

"Never prouder to be one!" Nadinia boasted. "Now let's pretend that I planned on doing this the whole time and just run!"

"Not yet," Hura insisted, grabbing her mace and holy symbol in one go from her scraps of clothes. The clothes themselves could wait.

"Agreed," Madam West nodded. "We came this far." She took her bag back from Nadinia and shoved two small beakers into her hands; one silver, one red. "When we're clear, you throw those as far and hard as you can at these things. Then we kiss their hive goodbye."

"If it works, I'll kiss you myself, you nutty old bat." The thief whipped a knife in between a charging pig's eyes, making it drop to the ground at her feet as she shuddered. "Still don't believe this' a good idea, though." The pig twitched and grabbed her around the ankle, getting Nadinia to scream and pelt its skull with her pick like she thought there was gold inside.

The queen was ranting at her children, barking orders in a mix of English and their garbled pig language. The swine were just getting around the putrid gas cloud when the queen pointed after the heroines, just for her hand to reach the holy woman's breast. She looked up as Hura braced a foot on the arm of the throne and bashed her face in with her mace, gritting her teeth as the heedlessly naked woman pulped the breeding psychopath. "I AM NOT YOU! I AM A RIGHTEOUS WOMAN! LIGHT GUIDE MY STRIKES THAT THEY SLAY THE WICKED AND GUIDE THE HOLY! BURN, EVER HOLY SUN, AND KILL! THE! WICKED!!!"

The queen only stared back at the ranting warrior nun with a mess of gore, squashed into a red and pink mess by the blows. Veron's latest battle cry reached her ears, twinged with pain as she bled and spat all over her swarming enemies. Hura glared back at them as her eyes glowed and she raised the mace.

"I am stronger than my flesh!" she barked in a pitch and volume to rival the barbarian's. "Smite these heathens, my righteous fucking Light!!"

A bolt of while struck down from the ceiling, as if by some unseen thunder cloud. It exploded among the lead few hogs, the rest cowering back as four of them blew up in sprays of gore against her comrades. "GO!" she shouted, and her comrades ran while Hura conjured another bolt to crush another pair of the monsters with her destructive light.

"Appreciate the effort, love," Madam West piped in as she grabbed her by her shoulder. Hura ignored her and blasted another one while she was dragged back. "But same goes for you. We're about to make this place very inappropriate for a last stand. All clear!"

Nadinia tossed the beakers over them, erupting in an instant to flood the room with a lethal cocktail of smoke, fire, and concentrated mushroom spores. The pigs began to wheeze and vomit over themselves as the women ran after Nadinia. She lead them past their packs, having memorized the way out long ago as she shouted over her shoulder. "Go left, straight, straight, left, right left straight! I won't tell you again, and I won't wait up!"

The women finally saw daylight. There was much crying and wretching from exhaustion, blood loss, and the unfamliar scent of fresh air, but they were alive. They would never dream of being the same again, but they were alive.

A bloody, half-naked Veron staggered into the office of the hamlet's new owner. "It's finished. It's dead." She left it at that and dragged herself back out to the inn. She slumped into the first stool at the bar and raised a hand with a weary groan. The portly bartender left the exhausted savage a full mug and a tall bottle without a word. Veron lifted an arm, brushing some mud off herself and squeezing one of her wounds. A drop of blood went into the drink, to remember a fellow tribesman lost, and drank until she couldn't feel anymore.

"It's on me," Nadinia said as she sat beside her. She was perhaps the least injured of the group, but her pale hair was still stuck here and there where she had failed to wash out her victims' blood.

"I have enough gold," Veron grumbled.

"And I've got a heavy conscience. Take the favor." She slid the gold over to the bartender and went back to her table. Lady Nadinia Varastova, heiress of the disgraced Varastova household, was well-dressed in a tasteful, ruffled blouse and dress that hid her muddy work boots. She had a pretty face that people could spot without her hat one, and they often saw her walking the slums instead of her old mansion. They still never knew where she got the wealth to afford such a place.

Madam West took off her mask, breaking in the perfumed air with a sigh. She shed the rest of her clothes, leaving the pale and curvy woman with the sunken face and boney but gifted fingers. She smiled at the pair of beautiful girls in the bed she had rented for a week, maybe more. "Thank you, girls," she said in her cracking voice. "Really. I could use some warm bodies for a change." She climbed into bed and kissed the redhead as she caressed the giggling blonde. "Now if it's not too much trouble... I have an odd request." West reached into one of her bags and produced the obsidian statuette, its tentacle still gleaming temptingly.

The Temple of The Light had open doors to confessors and converts, trying to remain as vast and warm as the sun itself as part of its core teachings. One of the sisters thanked a sweet old man as he left, just to look up and stare at the sight before her. Priestess Hura hobbled up the stairs to the temple, bruised and bloody and exhausted. Copious amounts of her cum ran down her thighs, one more cause of her shaking legs and hands.

"Sister, forgive me. I have sinned," she whimpered.

From a tactical point of view, the mission was a resounding success. The abominations that my uncle set into motion are dead, with hunters in the area reporting more and more of their corpses being found in the woods. I never got to see one myself, but I'm told they're quite a fright.

Given the profits and rise in spirits this has brought to the hamlet, I can't help but reconsider. Perhaps this place is not a lost cause. More strange and grim faces arrived over these last few days, and my uncle's manservant has brought me more of his diaries and (frankly) creepy notes. Perhaps these ladies and their new comrades would like to see some more coin and do some more good deeds.

-from the diaries of Duncan Darkest, newest lord of the local hamlet