Harpy Core: A Fantasy Harem Adventure Read online

  The building was at least a hundred years old, standing resilient and unforgivingly up a low incline thirty or forty yards ahead. In the dim white light it looked as if the front porch was gnawing at the air with jagged teeth, but as I approached I realised that they were simply long strips of hanging paint that had been ripped away by years of neglect.

  I surveyed the front of the building – windows were intact, albeit a slight crack in a pane on the upper floor. It was a squat, ancient construct with the look of an abandoned doll’s house, with a heavy door sat in the centre flanked by square windows on either side, two on the ground floor and two above. I pulled out my phone and shone the torchlight from its back onto the exterior. Redwood, much of it rotting and decaying horribly.

  I moved beneath the porch out of the rain and found the keys, trying the largest of the three first. It stuck in the lock but eventually clunked through a full cycle. The handle seized a little when I first attempted it, but after a harder push it broke free with a cloud of dust billowing into the air like smoke from a fire.

  At first I thought that the hinges were simply rusty, but after shimmying past the opening and into the dark innards of the reception hall I realised that it wasn’t the case; it was all thanks to the stack of unopened mail resting on the doormat.

  I fumbled for a light switch and found one, a bulb overhead flickering on.

  ‘Oh, holy mother of God.’

  Doorframes composed of rotting wood led off to the left and right, as well as a third up ahead that was parallel to a set of stairs. The doors themselves had been removed from their rusting, hanging hinges years ago; the only way that I could see a path to other rooms at all was through the stacks of newspapers and magazines, and piles of junk that seemed to line every wall.

  Considering the state of things, the smell actually wasn’t that bad – apart from the musty scent and the leaking damp that was seeping through the slightly visible red wallpaper.

  I decided first on checking out the ground floor to see what I was dealing with. Taking the left door into what seemed to be the living room, I moved between a sloping valley of objects and papers stacked haphazardly against both walls. It was stacked so thickly that there was no sense in trying to find a light switch upon entering the room.

  SNAP.

  The minimal amount of light and my wanton desire for a heart attack was cured when a black panel hidden on the far wall illuminated suddenly. Crackling static from an ancient block of a TV sent me flailing back into the junk behind me and slamming into the ground.

  The static continued to blare out as I panted for breath, groaning in pain and shifting slightly before feeling something sharp digging into my back.

  ‘Oh, God…’ I muttered, ‘… Please don’t be a needle…’

  My estranged grandmother may have had the kindness to leave me a whole house, even one as derelict as this, but just because she was technically family that didn’t mean I knew anything about the type of person she was.

  I mean, I didn’t have her down for being some kind of junkie, but when you’re slumped against a pile of garbage that looks like the bedsit of a meth addict with something sharp sticking into your back, thoughts like that begin to come into your mind.

  ‘Please don’t be a syringe, please don’t be a syringe, please don’t be a syringe…’

  I drew myself away slowly, finding my phone on the ground with the screen unshattered and turning the light onto the source of the sharpness.

  There was no sign of a needle; something blunter and thicker was protruding from the folds of junk.

  What the hell is that?

  I gripped the end between my thumb and forefinger, pulling the item closer to me to reveal-

  ‘A feather?’ I exclaimed to myself. ‘Well… I guess that’s not the worst thing it could’ve been by a long shot…’

  This wasn’t just the typical kind you’d pull from a worn couch cushion, though. It was at least a foot long, and perfectly white – a sharp contrast to the damp mustiness of the room around me, and the rest of the house. Every single one of its thousands of flowing strands still stood immaculately as I brushed the tips of my fingers over its softness.

  A soft clunk suddenly sounded from upstairs, sending me jumping in response and dropping the feather to the ground.

  I spun around, looking towards the hallway as the TV continued to play its static. It had been annoying me since it had started, but the soft company of the white noise it gave out was now more than welcome in the background.

  The visitor upstairs, whoever they were, definitely wasn’t welcome.

  Searching frantically for the closest thing that resembled a weapon, I found half a candle-stand sticking out from beneath a pile of (ironically) old housekeeping magazines. One end was broken and jagged, something strong having snapped it in half long ago.

  I held it before me and took several quiet steps, reaching the entrance hall once again and looking up the stairs towards the source of the sound.

  One constant in my life had been the opposite of just that; death. I wasn’t antisocial or a hermit or anything like that as a result of it, but most things I had done had always been overshadowed by the loss of my family. My grandpa’s passing, and the stiff-lipped beliefs he had pushed my way, had left me with a paradoxical need to protect those closest to me and a readiness to stare down danger.

  That didn’t make me an idiot, though – at least I thought it didn’t. If I needed to I could close my eyes and accept my fate, but that didn’t mean I would just put myself into dangerous situations. If anything I tried to avoid them, just like anybody would.

  This situation fell somewhere along the middle line. On the one hand this was an old house that had been left in disarray long ago, on the other there could still be somebody lurking around upstairs. I didn’t know a thing about my grandmother, and if she hadn’t been living in here for the past few years, which was likely considering the state of the place, it was a serious possibility that there could be a squatter calling the place his home.

  I listened in the quiet din of the reception hall, but there was nothing.

  ‘Hello?’

  And… Still nothing.

  Taking the first step of the stairs slowly in an effort to move as quietly as I could, I let my weight onto the chipped, exposed wood. It released an almighty creak, like the hinges of a door that hadn’t been opened in centuries.

  Wincing initially and pausing, I frowned and nodded to myself.

  ‘Guess a stealthy approach is out the window…’ I said to myself, before continuing loudly: ‘If anybody’s up there, come on out – and I’d appreciate it if you left without trying to kill me.’

  I took the steps quickly to the first floor, using the torch on my phone to search about in the darkness. There were three rooms to my left and two straight ahead, all of the doors closed. I made my way from door to door, one by one, greeted every single time by another wall of garbage that would barely allow me to take a single step forwards – until I reached the one at the end of the corridor.

  Trying the handle, I expected the same, but instead was met with a rattling rejection. It was locked.

  I fished out the keys again, trying the key one size down from that which worked on the front door. To my surprise it turned 90 degrees, and after a little shove the door gave from the frame, creaking back a few inches.

  I took a quick step back. Scanning the dark gap ahead of me and raising my light to it, I saw the wooden panels of the floor and walls. Raising my hand and steadily pushing the door wide with further creaks to match those of the stairs, a view of the room finally greeted my eyes.

  It was a small space with no windows and no features beyond a single thing – a steep, narrow set of wooden steps that were more of a ladder than a staircase. They led straight up to a square door in the ceiling, just large enough for a person to fit through.

  In sharp contrast to the door through which I had come, though, a large padlock was clasped around
the latch.

  ‘Clearly you didn’t want anybody to get in here…’ I said to myself quietly. ‘I wonder…’

  I looked at the keychain in my hand again, eyeing that final, remaining key.

  There was no way that I wasn’t going to check it out.

  I climbed the steps, forcing the key into the lock and twisting it. With a little pushing it clicked open reluctantly. I pulled the padlock free and dropped it to the ground with a heavy thud and returned to the door above me that presumedly led into the attic.

  More than a few possibilities of what could have been up there filled my mind. Jewels and rubies spilling from a chest like something out of a pirate movie was one thing. There was also the possibility that there would be even more junk… Or that it would be a reverse-Bluebeard scenario and the attic would be filled with the corpses of all the men my estranged grandmother had possibly murdered over the years.

  Okay, maybe that’s a little harsh, but the state of the place didn’t exactly reflect well upon her, and I didn’t know a thing about the woman.

  Leveraging my weight against the step I was standing upon, I pressed my hands against the door and pushed upwards. It flew upwards on its hinge in an explosion of dust, swinging back and booming onto the innards of the attic floor.

  I covered my mouth with my forearm. Coughing at what I had inhaled, I wafted the dust away with my other arm, barely managing to stay balanced on the steps in the process.

  When the dust cleared, I looked up to see the first light beyond the ground floor that didn’t come from my phone.

  A deep red, luminescent glow washed over the ceiling of the attic and the surrounding walls. It was almost nuclear in its strength, unrelenting and unnatural.

  I had considered a lot of things that could have been hidden up here, but the notion that grandma was a nuclear arms dealer wasn’t exactly high up on the list.

  I took another step and pulled myself up, looking into the attic.

  In contrast to the rest of the house, it was largely bare save for the opposite end of the floorspace, right at the back.

  At first I thought that the setup looked like some sort of shrine. A large table with a small backboard, almost like a writing desk, was littered by unlit candles and ancient scraps of paper. They all surrounded an ornate, elaborate pedestal in the centre, upon which sat the source of the red light.

  The orb was around six inches in diameter, and glowed with the same red that it emitted. Within I could see a swirling red mist, so thick and heavy that it seemed as if it was trying to escape from its confines.

  ‘What the hell is that…?’

  I pushed myself up into the attic, standing five or six yards from the orb on the other side of the space. I couldn’t figure out if it was hugely important considering the grandeur of how it was presented or nothing but a fancy snow-globe. Confusion dominated my thinking more than anything.

  One thing was for sure, though; my grandmother had crossed the line from shut-in to complete kook, and I had been pretty lenient in that classification so far.

  I moved towards the shrine, stepping up to it and surveying the papers. They were all scrawled with symbols in a language that I didn’t recognise. Some of it was written in neat lines, some in panicked, inconsistent scrawls that scattered the pages.

  Examining the orb, I brought my palms to within an inch of its surface. A tepid heat emanated from its surface.

  Without another thought, I picked up the orb in both hands and held it before me, looking closer into its cloudy interior.

  For a moment its state remained the same… Then, suddenly, the clouds began to swim faster and faster, breaking into strands in an effort to escape. They dashed themselves against the orb’s walls, swimming more and more aggressively. The light from the orb grew too bright too quickly, filling my entire field of vision, until-

  Silence.

  I clasped my eyes shut, opening them again to find myself surrounded by total blackness. I couldn’t touch anything, couldn’t feel anything, not even my own body. I was just a pair of eyes floating in the abyss.

  I tried to speak, but no sound appeared from my lungs.

  A white mist flooded in around me, and steadily a series of figures appeared. They were slightly obscured in their appearance, but I could make out their attire; ancient cloaks and armour, all tinted with the same redness that had emitted from the orb. Their faces were aged, the men bearded and the women with their hair tied up tightly behind their heads. They stood much taller than a typical human, towering over me by a few feet at the least.

  Who are you? What do you want?

  My mind said the words, but still no sound emerged from my mouth.

  The figures continued to survey me, before turning to each other and, almost in slow motion, nodded with small and resolute movements.

  They suddenly vanished into wisps of air, and darkness yet again returned, along with my body.

  Now I was falling. My stomach felt as if it was trying to claw its way out of my throat. Wind whistled in my ears.

  SMACK.

  The next thing I knew I was face down on rain-soaked grass, completely flat-out on my front. I hadn’t just rested down upon it, though; it was like I had been dropped from a few feet above, slamming down onto it.

  Fortunately it was thicker and softer than your typical front lawn, but it still hurt like a bitch.

  ‘God fucking damn it…’ I groaned, pushing myself up and feeling for my nose. There was no blood, and by some miracle it didn’t feel broken, but every part of me ached sharply with the promise of oncoming bruises.

  Pushing onto my knees and looking around I wondered how the hell I had gotten outside. Huge tree trunks were scattered about with jutting branches and leaves adorning them. Thick shrubbery covered the ground, luscious plants of all colours fighting for dominance of the undergrowth with the grass that I rested upon.

  Wait… How the hell am I seeing this?

  Bright light filtered through the trees overhead in droves. It was a midday glow, and I was stood in the midst of it.

  ‘What the fuck…? How…?’

  I was in the house, I went into the attic, and…

  The orb. What the hell had happened? I had picked it up, and the next thing I knew I was facedown beneath the trees.

  I must have blacked out, but that still doesn’t explain how the hell I wound up outside.

  I tried to rationalise how I landed exactly where I was. There must have been a forest near the house, maybe behind it. It was possible that I had ingested some kind of drug and had lost my memory. Carbon monoxide poisoning could have also sent me into a frenzy.

  My t-shirt and jeans felt as if they were pasted to me. It was supposed to be Autumn, and it was at least 95 in the small clearing that I occupied. I pushed my hand over my forehead; my dark hair was usually pushed out of my face, but now it had fallen above my eyes as if I had just dipped my head into a hot tub.

  Just a reaction to the carbon monoxide, probably. It was an old building. A god-damned death trap.

  I made a start forwards, figuring out that straight ahead looked like the least dense direction through the undergrowth, and retrieved my phone from my pocket. I would give the law firm a call and tell them that the building needed condemning. I would probably still be able to get a little money for the land after the building was demolished.

  No bars, no luck. I continued on through the forest for twenty or thirty yards, but my phone stayed determined that there was no signal whatsoever, wherever I was.

  ‘Great…’

  Beneath my feet I felt a vibration. At first I thought it may have been a tree toppling somewhere far-off, but that vibration remained steady before escalating into a rumble.

  My heart pounded in my chest as I turned in the direction of it. It was coming at me too fast to even bother to make a run for it, and within a second the source of the commotion was on me.

  Amongst the tall grass and the flourishing, vibrant plants, a herd of c
reatures appeared. They were like nothing I had ever seen – some insane crossbreed with the body of a wolf and the head of a reptile. Seeing them I made to run, but even if they were seeking to take me down it would have been pointless. The two dozen creatures, standing at only knee-height, arced around me with panicked screeches and moaning howls, hurrying past my legs and further into the heat of the forest.

  I watched them go, the final stragglers at the back of the pack departing along with the remaining rumbling.

  But then, another round began.

  And this time it was a constant, brutal booming all around me.

  The creatures hadn’t been hunting anything down at all – they were the ones doing the running.

  And in the direction from which they had arrived, a much more terrifying stampede was approaching.

  This time I knew to run.

  I set off sprinting in the same direction as the wolf-creatures, tearing through a wall of leaves and into a rough path that they had cleared. The stampeding seemed to remain constant in its loudness, as if it was always on my heels as I hurried past trees, clipping my shoulders on jutting branches and snagging my clothes on sharpened leaves.

  I would be covered in cuts by the time I made it out – if I made it out – but that was secondary to the one burning desire in my mind.

  Survive. And in order to do that, I had to run like the devil was on my heels.

  It may not have been the devil, but it was pretty fucking close.

  The trees became sparser, and a few seconds later I hopped over a bush scattered with blue flowers, destroying a couple of them in the process as I stumbled out into-

  A perfect blue sky towered overhead, surrounding the brightness of the midday sun that bore down upon me enormously. The creatures had scattered, and I was standing in a huge pasture of grass that rose several feet, almost to my waist.

  My feet pounded against the dry ground as I brushed aside the thick grass. I made it only thirty yards when my pursuers flew out into the open.

  I dared to take a glance over my shoulder, the fear of what was chasing me only sending my feet pounding harder and faster into the ground.