2/04/2025: The Hellish Coach Ride

The bonfire tips into the seat just vacated by Lynx, who has fallen atop Nesquo in a tangle of limbs. Nesquo’s pack bursts open on impact, its contents—rations, rope, a waterskin, weapons—scattering across the floor of the pitching coach. Freda sprawls at Murlack’s feet, while Tall Glumbo lands in a heap nearby, coughing as smoke rapidly fills the cabin. The heat, already oppressive, becomes searing, reddening skin and scalding lungs with every breath.

In the back row, Newt manages to keep his seat. Through the thickening gray haze, he can barely make out the chaos ahead—just shapes moving through smoke. He twists to peer out the rear window. His stomach drops. Their luggage, strapped to the exterior shelf, is fully exposed to flames licking along the coach’s outer walls. Without hesitation, Newt smashes his elbow through the glass and begins desperately hauling packs through the jagged opening, heedless of the gashes left on his arms by the broken shards.

As the worst of the smoke begins to clear, Tick crawls toward the window Varayathor disappeared through, carefully avoiding the charred, still-smoldering seat beside them. They lean cautiously toward the opening and immediately recoil. The air beyond roils with burning clouds, and what rushes in through the window carries an assault of sensations—acrid with the overwhelming stench of iron and brimstone. Through the toxic haze, a city glows red on the horizon. The coach hurtles toward it at impossible speed.

As passengers struggle to their feet, several freeze, torn between the mesmerizing horror of the approaching Iron City through the window and the fire spreading along the coach’s interior. “Does anyone have water? Any water spells?” The question comes out more like a plea.

On his knees, frantically gathering scattered belongings, Nesquo calls out, “I have Create Water!”

“Cast it!” Freda’s voice cuts through the smoke, sharp with panic.

“In a minute,” Nesquo responds, stretching beneath a bench for a parcel of rations just beyond his fingertips. “I need to get my stuff!”

“Your stuff can wait!” Lynx pleads, eyes streaming from the smoke. “Putting out the fire can’t!”

“In a minute,” Nesquo insists.

Far below, through gaps in the coach floor, Glumbo and Krasnyy spot figures in the hellscape beneath—devils wielding barbed whips, driving crowds of weeping souls toward the fiery gates of the city. The realization crashes over them: the coach has somehow crossed into the Nine Hells itself.

But before anyone can voice this terrible truth, the coach lurches into another sickening dive.

The fire has eaten through the coach’s wall. As charred wood crumbles away, leaving a gaping hole that sucks out much of the smoke—but what rushes in to replace it is far worse. Below the coach stretches a vast swamp, its foul surface bubbling with noxious gases. The stench of decay floods the cabin, thick and cloying, gags the passengers. A few double over, retching, from the combination of lingering smoke and marsh gas.

Murlack extends his hands, drawing upon an Elementalism spell. He pulls moisture from the stifling atmosphere, condensing it into water and directing it at the flames he created. The fire hisses and dies—but several companions cry out as the acidic water in the air stings their eyes, temporarily blinding them.

Through the windows and holes in the coach’s battered frame, devils of various forms begin rising from the mire—winged, clawed shapes pulling themselves from the bubbling filth. Before panic can fully take hold, the coach plunges again, spiraling down into a vast, roaring whirlpool.

An alien sensation grips each passenger. Their bodies begin to pull then to compress. Those who can still see watch in mounting horror as their limbs—and their companions’ faces—begin to change, flesh flowing like melted wax into completely alien forms. The transformation is soundless but absolute.

“This form will protect you from the great heat of Phlegethos!” Cornelius’s voice cuts through the confusion, shouting from the driver’s seat above and ahead. “You need this to prevent you from burning up! Phlegethos is the hottest of the Hells!”

“We’ve become lemures!” Nesquo’s voice emerges as a wet rasp from his new form. “Minor devils!”

Vision returns to those who were blinded, and a heavy silence falls over the group as they regard their new bodies—small, potato-shaped, covered in mottled flesh. Raisin-like eyes take in their similarly transformed companions.

Tall Glumbo spots a flight of winged devils passing nearby. He raises one stubby arm, waving to attract attention.

The nearest devil banks sharply toward the coach, wings cutting through the sulfurous air, and disappears over the coach.

Each lemure tilts their misshapen head upward as best they can. They hearing cloven hooves moving on the roof with sharp clops. Suddenly, the devil flips himself down, squeezing his lean form through the hole in the coach’s side. He settles comfortably into one of the fire-ruined seats with a satisfied sigh.

“Just the way I like it,” the devil murmurs, relaxation spreading across his pale orange face. Backward-coiling ebony horns frame his angular features. He regards Glumbo with curious yellow eyes. “I don’t often see one of your station traveling in so fine a coach, and this makes me curious. What is it that you wish to share with me, little lemure?”

Lemure-Glumbo, undaunted by the transformation, launches into an explanation of his people’s faith with surprising eloquence. The devil listens, genuinely captivated, nodding at intervals—until Glumbo makes an unfortunate choice of words.

The devil jerks forward, all pretense of relaxation vanishing. “Tell me again how your group will take over the Nine Hells?” His voice drops to a dangerous pitch.

“With chaotic energy! We’ll cause mayhem!” Glumbo declares proudly.

Several lemure-companions manage to roll their tiny eyes, recognizing the catastrophic error. Every devil despises chaos—it’s the essence of their eternal enemies, demons, with whom they’ve warred across millennia.

“You are fortunate I have a contract to fulfill,” the devil snarls, rising from his seat. “Otherwise…” He leaves the threat hanging, wings unfurling with a leathery snap. In one smooth motion, he launches himself back through the hole and into the burning sky.

For the final time, the coach plunges—this drop steeper than all the others combined. The small, dense bodies of the lemure-passengers are torn loose, thrown toward the back of the coach in a tumbling mass. Several bang painfully against the rear wall, but lemure-Nesquo rockets directly toward the broken-out window. His body plugs the hole with a wet thump. The howling wind tears away his backpack, ripping it from his small shoulders and carrying it into the void beyond.

Outside, a storm rages with apocalyptic fury. During the violent ride, the passengers begin to twist again—bodies stretching, remolding themselves to their usual shapes. Within moments, their original forms are restored. Relief begins to dawn on several faces.

Then comes a blinding blue-white flash that sears through the windows, followed immediately by a crack of thunder that seems to split the world.

A storm giant—impossibly as large as a mountain—regards the passing coach with eyes like burning lamps. Its face is distant, alien in its indifference. It draws back one colossal arm and hurls another bolt of lightning directly at them.

The world explodes in light and sound.

When awareness returns, the coach has landed—crashed, really—and skidded to a grinding halt. Outside the shattered windows, arctic wasteland stretches to every horizon, featureless and white and utterly lifeless. The temperature within the coach, so unbearably hot minutes before, plummets to bone-aching cold. Each breath emerges as a white cloud. Frost begins forming on the interior walls.

They have arrived in Stygia.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​