02/09/2026: Animus the Memory Collector

The party had only just settled into uneasy rest at the threshold to Malbolg when the temperature plummets further—impossibly further—and frost races across stone  of the Cave of Lost Things with predatory speed. The smell of sulfur and burning hair announces them before sight does.

Five nightmares emerge from the darkness, their flaming hooves striking the ice with sounds like stone breaking. Each hoofprint burns black into the frozen granite, scorching rather than cracking. Atop each infernal mount sits a wight in ancient, ice-crusted plate armor, their eye sockets blazing with cold blue fire.

The tallest rider flicks his reins and advances. His voice booms through the frigid cave, a hollow basso that reverberates in their chests: “I am Animus, Memory Collector of Stygia. An exit inventory of your party has revealed an unpaid debt. The beast that walks on two legs and speaks with the voice of men—it has passed the bounds of the Stygian threshold without paying tribute. The scales must balance and retribution must be exacted. We are here to collect the reckoning.”

The companions scramble to their feet, adrenaline cutting through their exhaustion. Behind Animus, four identical riders form an implacable wall. Their leader extends one gauntleted hand, and the entrance to Malbolge—their escape route—seals itself with a sound of finality.

Reklaw rolls to his feet, hands moving instinctively toward his weapons. “Who are you talking about? We all sacrificed memories when we entered Stygia!”

The knight’s gauntleted hand extends, pointing down at the rooster—their animal companion, their sole living reminder of Five, their lost comrade.

“Take him,” Vali mutters, though his voice lacks conviction.

“No!” The rooster’s voice cracks with terror. “I’m one of you!”

Kiki’s response comes heated and immediate. “There must be something we can do!”

The bleached, skull-like face of Animus swivels to regard the mapach, amber eyes burning in hollow sockets.

“We will take a sacrifice from the rooster—things most precious to him. Like yourselves, his sacrifice will fundamentally change who he is.”

He reaches down with terrible speed, snatching the rooster who dangles by his feet from Animus’s steel fist. The bird’s squawk of protest echoes off ice.

“And we will also impose a penalty.”

Lula murmurs to no one in particular, “The right thing to do would be to help your friend. The rooster has been a loyal companion since nearly the beginning of your travels.”

Arman steps forward, genuinely curious despite the danger. “What kind of penalty? I don’t want to give him to you, but I don’t want another fight.”

Those amber eyes find the changeling. “The bird must sacrifice either his speech or his martial skills. He becomes, again, merely a rooster. But one who suffers with the knowledge of what he has lost.”

Animus pauses, letting horror sink into their bones before continuing. “And, one of his party members must sacrifice a significant memory on the rooster’s behalf. Who cares for him enough to give up something important, something painful to lose?”

The companions shift uncomfortably, still raw from what their own memory losses took from them. No one speaks. The silence stretches like ice cracking.

“No?” Animus sneers, thrusting the struggling rooster into a leather bag. The bird’s muffled protests grow frantic. “The bird comes with us, then.”

“Isn’t there anything else that might be done?” Thunk’s voice breaks with desperation. Think has not been with the group long, but feels affection for the rooster.

Animus tips his head to one side, considering. “The rooster, or the party acting on his behalf, must swear to perform some future service to Stygia. Something simple: deliver a message, retrieve an object…visit someone in Malbolge.” The set of the creature’s body does not instill confidence in any member of the party that this ‘future task’ will be at all simple.

“What stops us from agreeing but not doing anything for you in Malbolge…and never coming back?” Vali challenges, though he knows the answer.

The temperature drops another impossible degree. Animus’s voice becomes deathly quiet, more terrible than his booming demands. “Do you think that the Hells do not speak to one another? That my will would not be enforced because I am not present? Test it, tiefling, and see how far the reach of Animus extends.”

Chastened, Vali falls sullenly quiet.

“But,” Animus continues, addressing the entire group now, “we would also be willing to accept collateral: something of significant value—a magic item, a valuable, a piece of private, vital information. Something that will hurt you to lose.”

The low growling starts from the back of the camp. Out of patience, Borark explodes forward, magical morningstar raised high, a roar in his throat.

As one, Vali, Arman and Reklaw lunge to intercept their hurtling companion—each misses.

The morningstar crashes into Animus’s chest with a sound like a gong, sweeping the knight backward off his nightmare. He lands heavily ten feet away, and the leather sack flies from his fist. The rooster tumbles out, skidding across ice to land before another undead knight’s mount.

The nightmare rears in surprise, its flaming hooves rising against the darkness. They come down heavily, striking the rooster with tremendous force. His small body sprawls on suddenly bloodied and feather-covered ice, alive but stunned.

Animus’s now-riderless mount rears as well, bringing its enormous burning hooves down on Borark with powerful blows. The barbarian staggers under the assault, the stench of scorched flesh filling the air.

Winding up for a mighty throw, Thunk heaves his holy symbol at the prone Animus, but it clatters harmlessly away, sliding over ice. Frustrated, he swings his mace—the blow goes wide. Simultaneously, Kiki’s catapulted stone swings past its Animus and the knight nearby him. Clunk’s crossbow bolt, however, buries itself in Animus’s chest plate with a metallic thunk.

Doggo slips from behind Kiki, spraying holy water at the knights. As it leaves the barrel, the blessed liquid becomes gelatinous and ignites, laying as burning spatter behind the undead knights, sizzling against ice.

In response, one knight urges his mount close to Borark and lunges, gauntleted palms glowing with sickly green necrotic energy. The barbarian twists away from those life-draining hands. An arrow from another knight’s longbow whispers past his ear.

Arman rushes forward, grabbing Borark and dragging him backward. “Stop! You’re going to get us all killed!”

“The decision is made.” Animus rises to his feet with terrible deliberation, ice crackling beneath his boots. He strides to the addled rooster and roughly stuffs the creature back into the sack. The bird’s muffled cries grow frantic within. Animus resumes his place in the saddle, looking down at them with those burning amber eyes. “Unless you’d like to continue resisting?”

No one moves. The only sounds are their ragged breathing and the restless stamping of nightmare hooves.

The undead knights turn their mounts, preparing to depart.

“We can’t just let them take him!” Kiki’s voice breaks. She, too, is attached to the bird.

Reklaw nods in grim agreement—he also does not wish to see the rooster taken.

Arman releases Borark, telling the group gently, “I’m not happy about this either, but I don’t think we can fight them.”

As the Memory Collector kicks his nightmare to a trot, the muffled cries from within the bag echo off stone, ever more frantic: “No! Please! Friends! Help me! Please!”

They fade. The cave grows quiet. The sealed entrance unseals with a groaning of stone.

None can meet the eyes of their comrades. They pack up camp in silence, each movement heavy with guilt. They climb into their truck without speaking. A rooster companion traded for passage forward.

Grinding her teeth, Kiki throws the truck into gear and navigates toward the portal. The vehicle plunges into darkness.

As they descend, the temperature climbs steadily. The dry, killing cold of Stygia gives way to damp heat. The companions strip off their heavier clothing. Some begin perspiring.

The atmosphere grows heavy, then positively oppressive. Pressure builds in their ears, pushing gently against their eyes. Their voices don’t carry properly in the thickened air—conversation becomes laborious.

Suddenly, Thunk and Kiki cry out in pain as the pressure becomes unbearable, hands clutching their heads. The pressure becomes intolerable to them, and it is many painful minutes before it passes.

“Malbolge,” Reklaw gasps.

“The Boiling Isles,” Vali agrees, wiping sweat from his brow.

Before them spreads a wasteland of massive bones rising from the landscape in nightmare profusion—ribs the size of buildings, jutting from sulfurous ground like ancient monuments to forgotten wars. Farther away, long bones tower into the glowering sky. On the horizon, what might be a monsterous skull glares out over the barren land.

What enemies lie ahead remains unknown, but guilt over their rooster friend will accompany them into whatever awaits.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​