CHAPTER 106: THAT’S THE LAST TIME I EAT GAS STATION SUSHI

Inside the antechamber, Finn and Seraphina stood there like two complete doofuses who had no idea what they were doing.

Which was accurate—they had no idea what they were doing.

Ahead of them, a staircase led up to two massive doors looming over the chamber. The surface was etched with ancient carvings—people kneeling in prayer before some strange, heart-shaped object at the center.

’Oh, well isn’t that nice.’

Finn frowned. These people clearly worshipped some weird god, and every red flag in existence was waving in his head.

It reminded him of old civilizations back on Earth—sacrifices, statues, child offerings. Creepy cult nonsense. He really hoped that wasn’t the case here, but all signs were pointing straight to "yep, definitely a creepy cult."

Seraphina glanced at him with a wide-eyed look—like those over-the-top clickbait thumbnails from fake scary videos. "What does that painting mean...?"

"I think it means ’praise the god.’"

"There is only one God... and that is the Goddesses."

"I’m not too sure about that..." Finn muttered.

"What was that?"

"Nothing!" Finn said quickly, stepping forward. "Let’s go, shall we?"

"Can you stop saying things and then not telling me what you said?! It’s getting annoying!" she pouted, following him up the stairs.

Before long, they stood before the towering doors.

"Well." Finn planted his hands on his hips, then looked at her. "Go on, open the doors."

"What?!" She instinctively stepped back.

"What? Open the doors so we can see what’s inside."

"But you’re the one who wants to see what’s inside!"

"Yeah, but I don’t want to get my hands dirty. Or cursed. So, go open the door."

Seraphina just stared at him in disbelief before reluctantly pressing her palms to the cold surface and pushing the heavy doors open.

Finn smirked and let out a soft, suspiciously villainous laugh as Seraphina pushed.

The ancient stone groaned, echoing through the chamber as the massive doors slowly gave way under her surprising strength. From the darkness beyond came a sound—low, rhythmic, and wet.

A beat.

A pulse.

Like a giant heart was slowly thudding somewhere in the depths of the room.

Seraphina instinctively stepped back, glancing over her shoulder. Finn stood frozen in place, Adam’s apple bobbing with a loud gulp. The sound wasn’t just creepy—it felt alive.

"Well... what do we do?" she asked, voice small.

"We move forward," Finn said, forcing calm into his tone. Then, without further discussion, he started toward the sound.

Inside, the room split into two staircases—one curling left, the other right—both descending toward the same central point. The walls were carved straight from the rock, but smeared with strange, glistening symbols. They looked painted in slime... and possibly other substances Finn preferred not to identify.

By now, Finn had stopped trying to figure out this world. Flying pigs? Sure. Weird eldritch slime cults? Why not. None of this was in his skill set, and he was very aware of that.

He chose the left staircase—not because it looked safer, but because in his personal philosophy, left was always right and right was wrong.

They crept down the narrow path, passing more unsettling symbols, until the two staircases joined again before a single archway.

Another deep beat rolled through the air, louder this time—coming from the room beyond. The same room where all those strange roars had been echoing from.

Finn and Seraphina exchanged a long look, one that said this is a bad idea but also we’re already here.

Then, together, they stepped through the doorway.

What they saw froze them in place.

Finn just stood there, jaw slack, his brain short-circuiting in utter—or rather, udder—shock.

They had stepped into a vast chamber where thick, glistening strands of slime dangled from above, dripping steadily from some unseen ceiling high in the darkness. The floor curved in a wide path around the centerpiece...

Or whatever you could call that.

In the middle dangling from the celling a massive cocoon-like mound, a grotesque fusion of slime, rotting organic waste, and whatever counted as "moist" in the worst possible sense. It was easily the length of a train—twice as tall and twice as wide.

The thing pulsed. It beat like a heart, and with each throb, more foul slurry oozed from above, splashing into the gelatinous shell. Chunks of trash, bodily fluids, and unidentifiable sludge disappeared into its heaving mass.

The floor below it was littered with half-melted skeletons, hundreds of them, each coated in a slick, acidic sheen as they slowly dissolved.

At least Finn now knew where the missing townsfolk had gone. And it was not a good retirement plan.

But one skeleton stood out.

It wasn’t just bones—it still wore scraps of clothing. And those scraps weren’t from this world.

They were modern.

From Earth.

Finn’s eyes went wide. Until now, other Earth-born people had been little more than rumors—words carved into walls, trinkets left behind. But here, right in front of him, was proof.

Proof that someone else had been here.

And proof they’d met a fate about as far from heroic as possible.

Finn stepped back in shock, trying to process what he was looking at.

The cocoon... God. It looked exactly like one of the turds he’d passed after eating gas station sushi with coffee and corn. He still didn’t know why he’d eaten that, but he had—and he still woke up screaming about it sometimes.

As he stepped back, his heel pressed into something soft. He nearly tripped, flailing, then glanced down.

A book.

’Why the hell is there a book here?!’

He crouched and snatched it up, flipping it open without hesitation.

The handwriting inside froze him again—it was nearly identical to the diary he’d found back in Moistvile. The same erratic penmanship. The same desperate tone. It had to be the same man... the one who had been losing his mind, bit by bit.

Finn gulped and turned a page—three silver coins tumbled out. His face lit up instantly. Without hesitation, he scooped them up and slid them into his pocket, whispering a mental thank you.

Seraphina’s eyes went wide. "You can’t just steal someone’s belongings! Especially if they’re dead! That’s wrong!"

Finn glanced up at her with a deadpan stare. "They’re long gone. And besides—who hides coins in a book?"

"I-It’s still wrong!"

With a long sigh, Finn took the coins back out, if only to shut her up for now. He focused back on the book.

The man’s writings spoke of voices whispering to him—telling him to give in, to join "everyone else." As Finn read on, the letters became increasingly messy, clumped together, devolving into barely recognizable scribbles.

Still, he forced himself through it. The final entries were chilling: the man described wandering deeper into this very cave, seeing strange structures, feeling his grip on reality melt away.

By the end, the words were nothing but praise for "the forgotten," vows to "become one with it," and an offering of his coins and abilities to "the great one."

Finn lowered the book, staring at the skeleton. Then, slowly, he slid the coins back into his pocket.

Seraphina scowled, opening her mouth—only for him to cut her off.

"No." He raised a hand to stop her. "He was going to give the coins to that thing." He pointed at the throbbing cocoon. "I’ll make better use of them. That’s called redistribution of wealth."

Seraphina just stood there, torn between outrage and disbelief.

But before she could answer, a deep, wet roar rolled through the chamber.

The cocoon shuddered violently, its pulse quickening before unleashing a shriek that ripped through the air like a banshee being boiled alive.

Both Finn and Seraphina clamped their hands over their ears, but Finn still felt them pop and ring in agony.

He just prayed he wouldn’t go deaf—because if this thing was about to kill them, he at least wanted to hear himself screaming.

"Damn it!" Finn shouted, his voice barely audible over the roar.

The sound rattled the entire chamber, dust and grit raining down from the ceiling. Then came the wet splats—thick gobs of slime dropping from above.

At first, they just twitched on the stone... then they started moving.

The globs slid together, pulling upward in jerky, unnatural motions until half-formed limbs began jutting out. Faces—if you could call them that—started pressing through the slime, their features warped and half-melted.

Within seconds, the shapes solidified into those same humanoid slime-creatures they’d run into earlier. Only this time, there weren’t just one or two.

There were dozens.

And that was when Finn and Seraphina realized they needed to get the hell out of there...