Chapter 57 Butcher’s Nest

The chamber was a graveyard.

Old blood, long dried and cracked, painted the cave walls like a grotesque mural. Entrails and rotting flesh were strewn across the ground, left to fester in thick, writhing swarms of maggots. The air was thick with the unbearable stench of decay—so strong, so overwhelming that it burned my nose and clung to my tongue.

And then my gaze locked onto the corpses.

Goblins.

My fellow goblins, the ones who had made this place home. Their bodies were everywhere—ripped apart, limbs missing, torsos shredded into unrecognizable lumps of gore. Some were half-buried under rubble, their faces twisted in eternal screams of agony.

Once, this cave had been our home.

A small, cozy place carved into the earth, nestled beneath the tall grass of the open plains. It had been warm, filled with the sound of small crackling fires and the soft murmurs of goblins settling in for the night. The scent of fresh grass had always lingered in the air, blending with the distant chirps of insects and the rhythmic rustling of wind through the fields.

It had been a sanctuary.

I could still remember how the hatchlings used to tumble across the dirt floor, squealing with laughter as they rolled over each other in play. Their tiny claws scrabbled against the stone as they chased each other in circles, giggling and shrieking as we, the older goblins, watched over them. We would tease them, ruffle their soft heads, and chuckle when they clung to our legs like tiny, clumsy leeches.

I staggered forward, my mind blank. My foot hit something soft, and I looked down.

A small body. A tiny, frail body, smaller than the others.

"No… Please! No, no, no—"

A hatchling. Or what was left of it.

I fell to my knees, my vision blurring. My hands trembled as I reached out, but I couldn’t bring myself to touch the little corpse. My heart pounded so hard that it felt like it would shatter my ribs.

"Why... why dis... why dis one...? Ain't... ain't fair... ain't right...! I done everythin' right... fed 'em, kept 'em warm, tried ta be good... so why...?" 

A sob wrenched free, raw and ugly.

"Why me? Why always me?"

My fingers twitched toward the hatchling's body but recoiled at the last second, as if touching it would hurt me.

"Ain't asked for none o' dis... ain't wanted dis life... just... just wanted dem ta be safe... just dat... Ain't even hatched proper yet... ain't even seen da sky... What I do... what I do ta deserve dis...? Hurt nobody... loved 'em right... so why... why dis...?"

The cave offered no answer only the silence and the tiny, cold body.

"Ain't fair... ain't fair... ain't fair..."

It was a horror show. A butcher’s nest.

The walls that once held warmth were now splattered with dried, cracked blood, smeared in streaks as if something had dragged its prey across the stone. Patches of fur and flesh clung to the jagged edges of the cave, torn from bodies and left to rot.

The ground was wet. Not with water. Not with mud. But with congealed, sticky pools of filth—blood—seeping into the dirt, dark and thick. Rotting flesh littered the floor, shredded beyond recognition, as if something had gnawed on the remains and spat them out like chewed-up gristle.

Bones jutted from the gore, snapped and crushed, some still strung with sinew. Little hands—tiny goblin hands—lay scattered like discarded toys, some still gripping onto nothing, frozen in the last moment of terror before death.

The hatchlings that had once tumbled and played here, who had once squealed in delight as they leapt into my arms—

They were gone. No, worse than gone. Their tiny bodies had been devoured.

Half-eaten corpses lay crumpled against the walls, their soft bellies torn open, their insides hollowed out as if something had feasted on them while they were still alive. Some were nothing but bones, others just mutilated lumps of flesh barely clinging to their original form.

They were all dead. My family, my kin, my hatchlings. Gone. 

I gagged. My stomach twisted violently, but there was nothing left inside me to throw up. My throat clenched, burning, but no sound came. This place had once been filled with the warmth of life. Now, it was a grave. No—worse than a grave. It was a slaughterhouse.

Something had made a nest here, a wretched, gore-soaked den. I could see the marks—huge, clawed footprints smeared in dried blood, deep gouges scraped into the walls where some enormous creature had made itself at home, using the corpses of my kin as bedding.

I turned, my body shaking, my breath coming in quick, ragged gasps. My vision blurred as I stumbled forward, my foot slipping on something wet. I looked down.

A half-eaten hatchling. Its little face frozen in agony.

I collapsed, my fingers digging into the filth-covered ground, my entire body wracked with a silent, suffocating scream.

A choked sob tore through my throat, but the horror swallowed it whole. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t think. I had crawled through the depths of suffering to get here.

And for what?

There was nothing left.

But cruel world did not let me weep in sorrow, something grabbed me from behind and started to drag me. I did not resist it, what was the point, I already lost everything.   

The End of Part 3