The Tower of Zhaal (Cthulhu Armageddon Book 2) by C. T. Phipps

Author:C. T. Phipps [Phipps, C. T.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: lovecraftian horror, post-apocalyptic
Publisher: Crossroad Press
Published: 2017-01-22T06:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eighteen

Our vehicles came to a stop in the middle of the picturesque town. Something about the atmosphere was disorienting.

The city of Insmaw was formed of glass-window shops, two-story townhouses, a public library, and a large stone courthouse which looked like a new construction rather than a converted Pre-Rising building. A bronze statue of a nude woman with six arms stretched outward and a depiction of the sun for a head was in the village square.

I recognized this as a depiction of the Great Old One Vastarara, identified by some occult scholars as another face of Cthugha and by the Dunwych as a daughter of Shub-Niggurath. It was a wrathful fire-deity whose cultists engaged in orgiastic excesses and bacchanalia. Here, Vastarara seemed to have taken the role of a peaceful harvest goddess since there was no sign of the blood-stained altars, burning hearts, or writhing sensual mystics that so characterized my memories of the deity. That was the real trick of the Great Old Ones, though. Ninety percent, and that was lowballing it, of what people knew about them was delusion or lies.

People made up stories about the millions of strange godlike aliens throughout the cosmos and sought to impose some order or reason to it all. They made up tales of how Cthulhu, Cthugha, or Azathoth cared about what color skin you had or what hand you wiped your bum. I was a religious man and thus not unaware of the hypocrisy, but it offended me on some level to see yet another monster deified. The real Vastarara, if she existed at all, was in all likelihood some sort of vampiric monstrosity who incinerated people and ate their ashes. That was the sort of world we lived in. There was nothing romantic or beautiful about the Great Old Ones, unless you wished to admire their sheer power and immortality.

Men will eventually worship you, John, Nyarlathotep whispered. You will indulge in every vice and encourage them to sin against all convenience. Assuming, of course, you live long enough to become a monster lesser beings will revere. I suppose when humans are extinct, you can force rabbits and worms to pray to you.

I ignored the demon in my ear.

“This is a nice place,” Mercury said, looking out the side window of the Hummer. “I wonder if they’re receiving blessings on their crops.”

“I suspect it’s more the ample number of underground springs in this area,” August said, shrugging. “It’s possible to use magic to bring blessings down from the spirits of the Dreamlands or the psychic dreams of the Great Old Ones, but that’s a bit like using a nuclear bomb to dig a well. Do you know what a nuclear bomb is?”

“I’m not from a village of savages, August,” Mercury muttered. “I grew up in the Remnant.”

“Now, see, that’s an oxymoron,” August said, opening the back door and heading on out into the bright sunlight.

Bobbie followed him.

“Do you think you can walk, John?” Mercury asked. “That Reanimated did a pretty bad number on you.

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