The Unseen, Almost Seen (And Still Utterly Terrifying)

The lure of "easy shinies" and "cooked bits" proved irresistible to Gnikpaugh’s goblin sensibilities. His limp, a lingering souvenir from our Cave Troll tango, became noticeably less pronounced as he bustled about their damp alcove, gathering his meager possessions for the grand expedition to the "Upper Dark." This mostly involved stuffing a few questionable dried fungi into his looting sack and ensuring Ol' Rusty was securely (if uncomfortably for me) tucked into his belt. He even tried to "sharpen" me again on that infernal piece of gritty sandstone, a sure sign he was feeling ambitious.

Right then, Upper Mines it is, I thought, resigned. Hopefully, the dwarves up there have better taste in ambient cave lighting. And perhaps fewer things that consider goblins a mobile appetizer.

We were just about to leave the relative (and I use that term loosely) safety of their current warren, Gnikpaugh humming a tuneless, vaguely threatening goblin ditty, when the world decided to remind us that the Deep Deeps still had horrors aplenty to offer.

It started subtly. A sudden, unnatural hush fell over the network of tunnels. The usual drips and skitters ceased, as if the very vermin of the cave were holding their breath. Gnikpaugh’s humming died in his throat. He sniffed the air, his ears twitching.

Then, the cold.

It wasn't the creeping chill of a drafty passage or the damp cold of deep stone. This was a sudden, violent plunge, as if we’d been teleported to the heart of a glacier. The air solidified, crackling with an unseen frost. Gnikpaugh’s breath didn't just fog; it practically crystallized before his face, each gasp a painful intake of frigid air. This was far more intense, far more present, than our previous encounters with the Big Cold.

“NO! NOT AGAIN!” Gnikpaugh shrieked, raw terror obliterating any thought of shiny dwarven leftovers. He didn't hesitate. He spun, grabbed me, and bolted for the deepest, most secure hiding spot he knew – a tight, coffin-like fissure barely wide enough for his scrawny frame, tucked away behind a massive, moss-slick boulder. He practically embedded himself into the rock, me clutched tight against his rapidly thumping chest, his body quaking like a leaf in a hurricane. He was utterly, abjectly petrified.

The malevolent presence swept into our immediate vicinity like an invisible, crushing tide. The pressure was immense, a physical weight that seemed to squeeze the very air from Gnikpaugh’s lungs. The cold intensified until I could feel it even through Gnikpaugh's leathery hide, a chill that resonated deep within my metallic structure.

And then, Gnikpaugh, in a paroxysm of pure, unadulterated terror that momentarily overrode his survival instinct to remain completely hidden, cracked an eyelid open for the barest fraction of a second.

Through that fleeting, horror-struck slit of vision, amplified by Gnikpaugh’s terror and my own strange connection to his senses, I "saw" it. Or rather, I perceived an impression of it, at the very edge of the flickering, pitiful light cast by a distant patch of luminous fungus Gnikpaugh usually kept his sputtering torch near (which, thankfully, he wasn’t carrying).

It wasn't a creature of flesh and bone. It was… a void. An enormous, shifting patch of absolute blackness, deeper and more profound than any shadow, a hole punched in the fabric of the dim cave. From this impossible darkness, fleeting, nightmarish angles and shapes seemed to coalesce and dissolve, geometries that twisted the eye and screamed of realities beyond mortal, goblin, or even sentient-dagger comprehension. There was a suggestion of immense, uncoiling limbs, of countless unseen eyes, of a presence so ancient and alien it made the very concept of "monster" seem quaint. It was a sight that clawed at the edges of sanity.

Gnikpaugh slammed his eyes shut with a soundless, internal scream, emitting a continuous, high-pitched, muffled keen against the rock, his body rigid with a terror so profound it was almost catatonic.

The glimpse was gone. But the afterimage, the wrongness of it, burned into my awareness like acid.

Nope. Nope, nope, nope. Absolutely, unequivocally, NOPE, my internal monologue gibbered, abandoning all pretense of wit or sarcasm in the face of pure, unadulterated cosmic dread. Did not see that. That was… that was just a bit of undigested cave bat. A very large, very dark, geometrically impossible, sanity-devouring bit of undigested cave bat that warps reality with its mere presence. Right. Upper Mines sound lovely! Positively delightful! Full of sunshine and daisies and well-behaved dwarves who probably leave neatly wrapped leftovers! Let's go there. Now. Immediately. Before my non-existent sanity unravels completely and I start contemplating the philosophical implications of being a very pointy paperweight in a universe clearly designed by a mad god with a grudge against straight lines.

The presence lingered, an eternity of cold and pressure, then, with agonizing slowness, it began to recede. The decision to head for the Upper Mines, previously a matter of goblin greed, had just become a matter of urgent, existential necessity.