Saturday, April 24, 1937.

2120 Hours. 

Table Room.

"Sebas, brother," whispered Torito. "Where the fuck are we?" 

"I thought you said you found the exit!" I cried back. "I'm just following you!"

"I'm following you!" said Torito. 

"How can you be following me if you're in front of me?"

"Clearly, there has been a problem in communication, brother," said Torito. 

I had been following him for a good ten minutes now. He had explicitly said he had found an exit. Curse me and my sheep mentality. 

"But you said-"

"I know what I said," interrupted Torito. "The markings clearly said to follow this path to, and I quote, 'bury a King.' Clearly, they are toying with us." 

We had arrived in another room, but there were no roots in there this time. It was quite smaller than the ones we had seen prior, and quite more dank as well. There was a hint of moisture and copper in the air that told me there was something wrong with that room. A single wooden table stood in the middle of the room surrounded by old, melted candles covered in dust. 

"This doesn't look like any cemetery I know," I said. My arms were aching, and so were my wounds. I could feel the filth on my skin making grime with my sweat. I felt like pure, unabridged shit. "Help me get the coffin on the table." 

The table collapsed as soon as we placed it on the table. 

"Dammit, Sebas. Don't go breaking the coffin, now," said Torito with his mocking smile. 

"You drop the thing all the time, too. And it didn't break. Give me a minute to rest my arms."

"As you wish," said Torito. He dusted his hands and left to a corner to examine at some writings on the wall. 

I took my time to gather my breath, shaking my arms from side to side to make the tiredness go away. It didn't work quite as expected but was better to oy sit around and wait. Just as Torito did, I paced back and forth in the room to try to get my bearings. Besides the candles and the table, there were also vases of different sizes and colors strung about, all of them marked with different words in Latin. 

I looked inside of one particularly big vase to find long, white needles. They were made of a porous material that was smooth to the touch. I felt I knew what it was, but couldn't quite make out what it was.

"I wouldn't touch that if I were you, brother," said Torito as he pressed the light against the markings on the wall.

"Why?"

"I misread the marking," he said. "It didn't say 'to bury a king.' It said 'to kill a king.'"

I knew then what the material was. It was bone. Human bone. It all clicked for me. The smell of copper and moisture was stale blood. That did it for me.

"What the fuck even is this place?!" I asked. "Why is it underground?! What's with the Latin and the needle bones?!"

"Hush," said Torito, not much as a request as it was a command. It wasn't loud or aggressive, but rather plain. And yet, full of gravitas. It stopped me in my tracks. 

"You have to know that this town was an ancient capital of Biscay. Kings and sovereigns came here all the time to swear fealty to the land, have secret meetings, and discuss the matters of the subjects with the leaders of other regions. Tunnels such as these were probably a way to move about safely. As for the bones," he said as he picked one from a vase near him. "I think it is but a fetish item. Bones from enemy Kings, or those who broke their oath." 

"Sick," was the only thing I could say. "There is a weird energy coming from these things." They felt pulsating, almost alive, I would say. It begged me to break it and set whatever was inside free. 

"Maybe they thought they contained the souls of their enemies, forever trapped inside their bones," said Torito. He placed his hands on the wall, removing the dust from them. "There is a ceremony here to do it."

"Spare me the details."

"Details coming right up, brother," said Torito with a mocking tone. "See, you have to take out a bone out of the person while they are still alive, make a cross out of them, and shove it through the person's heart while they still breathe. Fun!"

"Bullshit," I said. "Who would believe such utter rubbish?"

Torito threw his arms to the air while giving me a mocking laugh. "Oh, I'm sorry. Why don't we continue our search for that unholy monster with a bone mask that can speak directly into your mind to shove in an old coffin?"

On cue, a sound tore through the tunnels and into our chamber. It also tore through my tiredness and injected a fresh wave of fear down my soul.

It was a gunshot. 

What came next was a blur. All I remember is my heart trying to burst from my chest as my brain pulsates to its beat. Each breath drew more air, but less oxygen. I was as light as air itself, not comfortable in my own body enough to recognize it. 

Next thing I knew, I was following Torito down where we came from. I opened my mouth to speak, but it was dry; I was parched. 

I think I asked him where we were going at some point I don't quite recall, but I do remember he responded. 

"We are following the sound!"

"Which sound?!" I asked. 

Torito turned back to answer, but while his lips moved, no sound came from them. No sound came from anywhere. No footsteps, no breathing. The only sound I could hear was my racing heartbeat and throbbing brain. Or I thought it was. It took me a few seconds to realize it wasn't my heart or my brain, but the incessant cacophony of hundreds of drums playing in staccato. 

That was the sounds. We were using their own weapons against them. If it weren't for Torito pulling me along, I would've frozen in place. Every atom in my body told me to either run away, or surrender to the beast, and I wasn't sure which one to choose. Torito gladly made that decision for me as we ran through the tunnels. 

Until we reached the cemetery. 

There it was, sitting atop an old, marbled tomb; a King amongst the dead and decaying. To his feet, being pinned down like a rat, was Father Maximino. Hanging from the beast's hand and flailing like mad was Camarada. 

Three flashes came from his gun which sounds I couldn't listen. I was submerged in the presence of the beast. In his divine, everloving presence. 

What were we thinking? We didn't stand a chance against him. We were all too lovestruck to try and move against it.