Gary Gygax - Dance of Demons

"Courflamme?"

The archfiend waved his hand airily. "Have you forgotten what I said in that regard? No matter. Your sly trap has also benefited me. The blade is most vulnerable at a certain place there beneath Greyhawk." There was far more, but Tharizdun didn't speak of it. He had done most of the work that Entropy claimed, of course. With carefully orchestrated moves, the three had been forced to the place they now were. By wild yeth harrying them, lands torn by strife, spheres devastated, avenues barred. champion and heroes had been put into the exact place Tharizdun wanted them to be.

Did the ultimate expression of Evil recognize that his destruction and slaughter led along a path that ended in the inevitability of extinction? Extinction of not a race or species, but the annihilation of all life followed by the cessation of activity in all aspects of the multiverse? Tharizdun did ponder that very consideration. He wrote off the whole question as ridiculous. In a cosmos of infinite probabilities, infinite realitles, what mattered a few billion deaths? Even the snuffing out of a galaxy or two? Entropy sought vainly to rule in a limitless arena where life, energy, or simply motion would always spawn itself. Hubris always reasons thus, for if a course is determined regardless of what will eventuate because of its pursuit, there are always internal means of rationalizing whatever then occurs or seems probable under known conditions. It can't happen here, to me. .

Entropy too had reason to indulge in introspective questions. Did the archfiend labor under self-delusion? Or was Tharizdun's seeming hubris no false and bloated confidence in his own ability? What if that being could somehow sustain a wholeness of evil activity and repression that blanketed every aspect of the multiverse but failed to bring nullity? That was as unacceptable a thought to the entity as was sharing to the archfiend. If Tharizdun demonstrated a confidence. it was because of his own limitations, his failure to comprehend the certain destiny of the cosmic all when a set of conditions came into being. The stage was set, just as the archfiend had desired, but Tharizdun was but an actor. Entropy wrote, managed, and directed the actuality.

"We meet again in the depths beneath the castle then, Tharizdun."

"But of course, entity of inertia, but of course. Shall we say in one hour, by local reckoning?" Tharizdun heard no reply, for Entropy had already dissipated its essences. With a dark smile and wicked laugh, the archfiend transported himself elsewhere too. It was time for the last wild hunt.

Nothing was as it had been, should have been still. The places where the existence of other spheres impinged on that of the world of mankind were diminished. The elemental presences were but small manifestations of power. Nature was miniaturized. The mighty Yang and Yin were pygmy-sized and powerless things who fled instantly upon seeing the three. A test of energies garnered scarcely a trickle of the bright force of creation, the same with respect to the dark energy of destruction.

"The elements provided virtually nothing," Gord said unbelievingly, "and now Balance proves to be likewise inadequate. Some great change has been wrought here."

"Do our enemies see so far into the future that they can do thus?" Gellor was speaking more to himself than to his comrades, grim wonder on his visage.

Leda comprehended the actuality. "It is the hedging off which has done this, bard. When we were barred from plane and probability line, this nexus of such spheres was abridged. I am sure of it, for how else could the diminished states of the places have come about? Gord certainly has not misremembered."

"That's true enough. I have no memory lapse. There is still one place left which I recall. The hillman caused me some grief there. . " Gord paused and blinked away a rising tear as he thought of Chert. "Gone now, vanished with the rest. No sense in such maudlin meandering. We have a problem to overcome!"

The three went onward until coming to an extensive cavern wherein lay a small lake of glittering water. The surface of the pond was undulating, as if monstrous saurians were cavorting beneath it, and the water had a sickly disturbing sheen. "Eeerg! What is this?" Gellor asked with loathing written on his face as he viewed the place.

"It is disgusting," Leda agreed, looking at Gord for enlightenment, for he had not mentioned such a revolting locale to them in his recounting of his sojourn in the places beneath Greyhawk Castle.

"It must be … It can be only the Sea of Thought! But that is impossible! When I was here before, there were no visible shores, and the water was as bright as a sunlit ocean. Perhaps we direct it thus — our thoughts make it thus. Come on, you two, think of expansive power and the might of justice."

After a moment the surface became somewhat less disturbed, and the ghastly appearance of the big pond was no longer apparent. The extent of the water was unchanged, however, and it remained sinister. "This is the sum total of thought here, on Oerth, In all places which form its cosmos now, Gord," the oneeyed troubador said as he observed the scene. "When you came to this juncture before, the whole of the multiverse manifested itself in the expression of Thought at this nexus. Now Oerth's reality is cut off, a shrunken portion of the multiverse. It is a cul-desac which fills with ever-growing evil, so the sea is now but a polluted pond."

"Then we are.. "

"Finished. At least, our hopes of renewing our strength to its maximal condition are, Leda." Gord grimaced, then made up his mind. "I'll draw what I can from this little lake, for ring and into Courflamme too. Can you manage likewise?"

Both of his friends eked what energies they could into their bands under Gord's direction. Drawing anything of Good from the pond was dangerous and trying. Thereafter, the young champion concentrated his thoughts upon draining any wealsome force left into his own ring. There came a trickle only. At last he used the sword to draw any remaining power usable into itself. The process was over quickly. Now the waters were shrunken and putrescent. He was about to lead them on into whatever was beyond when there was a sudden boiling from lake. "Are you causing that with your imaginings, you two?"

"No!" Gellor cried. Leda merely shook her head.

"Get back! The level is rising." Gord warned, heading back the way they had come as he alerted Gellor and Leda. The pond was rising as if some underground torrent were suddenly unstoppered and filling the basin there with its gushing flow. The liquid was not the bright stuff of former times, however. If anything, the waters that now rose were more hideous than moments before the surge.

"What does this mean?" the elven girl asked with horror. She was afraid her conclusion was correct and dreaded it, and the answer Gord gave made Leda's worst fears realized.

The archfiend and his minions are near," the champion said with a slow, lugubrious tone.

Gellor was not so despondent. They must come through these very waters. That's what is causing the swelling of this piss-puddle's volume. Let us by all means give them a warm greeting when their foul heads surface!"

All three moved back to a position of advantage and readied for the coming of Tharizdun. Almost immediately, he and his howling pack of hounds broke the tossing waters.

There was a stench accompanying archfiend and yeth. a reek so strong it almost overpowered the three. It rose from master and hounds and the stuff of Thought there. It was charnel and bitter, the stench of rotting vegetation and excrement too. With the malodorous assault came a din of foul noise that was as indescribable as it was deafening, composed of the howling and yammering of the diverse-headed hounds, Tharizdun's wild shouting and laughter, accompanied by screams from some nether place and the screeching and booming of the sorcerous means by which the evil company had come. Up surged the stuff of Thought there, and it was as a cesspool's flooding. Out rose the monstrous yeth and their master. and the suppuration of the foul pond was preferable to such as wallowed in its filth.