The Journey to Nakai

Jan 14th

Nakai has long since been dormant, save for the ghostly apparitions that crawl along its blackened sides. Of course, it is difficult to believe Johnny’s ghost stories on the best of days, but I will admit that even in a drunken stupor, the man knows how to spin a tale.

I had never heard of Nakai Mountain, though to my credit, I do not leave home much nowadays. It has been many years since I explored the world, so I thought perhaps this place was a new discovery. Johnny was having another one of his fits, the kind only alcohol seems to calm. He says the mountain is short, especially after one eruption caused tons of stone to collapse into the magma chamber. Now it sits nestled in a barren, black waste that the explosion created.

I must admit, I was interested. My study is quite large, and my library is a testimony to my travels. However, even after a thorough review of my books, there was no mention of Nakai. Somehow, Johnny managed to stumble his way through my home until he reached the study. I know I should not have—the man was clearly unwell after the night before—but I could not help but demand of him the location of the mountain.

He blinked, being very hesitant to tell me anything, but after I promised him medicine and a dark room to rest, he finally admitted where Nakai was. Far away, to be sure, at least a two-week journey, though the train will get me most of the way. Johnny said that the area had been abandoned even before the mountain erupted all those years ago, so accessible roads will be nearly impossible to find. He seemed to be under the impression that even seeing the mountain would leave you mad. He began to get hysterical at this point, and anything more he said was pointless to my research.

I sent Johnny to bed, seeing as it's impossible to get more information out of him while he is in this state. While I may not have any information about Nakai, I can research what I will need to traverse the terrain. I may be older, but I have not reached the end of my exploring days, and Johnny’s stories intrigued me. I will have to ask him to recount the finer details. If I do make my way to the mountain, I want to be prepared.

Though how helpful Johnny will be in that regard, I cannot say.

Jan 15th

A sober Johnny, it turns out, is incredibly hard to get information out of.

As soon as he woke, I brought him down to my study. He was surprisingly timid once I brought up the mountain, almost ashamed. When I tried to explain my hypothetical route to Nakai, he shook his head.

“I should not have told you that story,” he said, grabbing my arm with a grip tight enough to bruise. “The mountain is abandoned for a reason.”

Johnny had gone pale, so I set him down and asked him to explain further. He had not, after all, gone into much factual detail in his drunken story. It was nothing more than a ghost tale to tell late at night with a friend. The more I asked him to explain, the more jittery he became, until eventually he was hunched over in his chair.

To him, Nakai is more than a caldera in a blackened land. It is a sacred place, bordering on holy land for people who have long since stopped existing. I doubt the poor man was telling the truth. I felt guilty, as my home is where Johnny always comes to retreat when his mind gets the better of him, and yet here I was causing him more distress. He has been a drunkard for as long as I have known him. Clearly, his fragile mind was broken further when he went to Nakai, a place that must have been filled with noxious gases that made his condition worse.

How could a volcano be cursed? Even Johnny says the volcano is no longer dormant. Of course, no one would live in a place that had yet to recover from such a horrible disaster. I tried to quiet the man, but he began to babble restlessly. I let him mumble about how the ‘only people at the mountain now are those who become a part of it’ while I fetched him some water from a pitcher, which seemed to calm him down.

I was about to escort the man back to his room when he grabbed my sleeve, begging me to forget he had ever told me about the mountain. He was so pale that I found myself agreeing, though I knew it would just be to appease the man. After all, if Johnny was telling the truth, there is history at Nakai that no one else has seen in decades, possibly even more. I would be a fool to pass up this opportunity.

Feb 2

The journey took longer than I would like to admit, but Nakoa is only a day’s walk from the inn I am staying in. Though calling it an inn is very gracious. The shack was on the side of the road, and my pack had long since grown heavy on my back. The old man who lives here barely spoke, though perhaps he saw how haggard I was, because he let me in without a word. He is sleeping as I write this by the smallest candle I have ever set my eyes on. I can only be thankful he let me use it.

Johnny had been right to say that the area around Nakai is heavily abandoned. I have been on foot ever since I left the train platform, and a heavy bit of rain slowed me down further. Thankfully, it seems that despite my break in exploration, my body has not forgotten its old functions. The walk has not been nearly as bad as Johnny seemed to think it would be.

Speaking of Johnny, I can only hope he does not become too angry with me. I did leave my home in his care while I went out, and I left him a note telling him to make use of my wine collection as he sees fit. I’m sure that when I return, I will get an earful from him, but I believe it will be worth it.

The candle is going out, and it is best I get some sleep before I set out to Nakai in earnest. Perhaps the old man will let me use some of his water to take a quick bath. It will be quite a while before I will be able to clean myself. I can already feel the soot of Nakai on my skin.

Feb 3

The old man did not say a word when I left his shack. At least, he did not say a word to me. I heard him muttering by his bed, and from the way he crossed himself, I would assume it was some kind of prayer. I did not take him for a religious man, but I digress.

I write this from a cave in the side of a mountainous chunk. It is still light enough that I can see my book, but I know that when the sun goes down, I will be in complete darkness. This cave must have been made from some kind of lava flow, as it does not look like any kind of natural stone. It is far too smooth, with trails where the magma cooled.

The entire land is black, and in the center of this desolate place is the sunken caldera of Nakai. It looks nothing like other volcanoes I have seen. The strangest thing is how I did not know of this place. It is so close to my home, and yet the place seemed not to exist until Johnny told his story. Perhaps the local government had something to do with this. It is a dangerous place, after all. When I was still digging for information, Johnny had mentioned that it was easy for people to get lost, though how, I have no idea. There are no clear obstacles between Nakai and me. There is a bit of smog in the area; perhaps that is what he meant?

The sun has begun to set, and so I shall do my best to settle down in this cave. Tomorrow, I should be at the base of the mountain.

4?

I do not know what else to do. My hand shakes as I write this.

There was a weak spot in the rock. I do not know how; this area should have long since cooled, and yet my foot fell through something thin, and my left leg had submerged into the hole before I caught myself. The pain—it is gone now, but in that moment, it was unlike anything I have ever felt.

I must have fallen unconscious, for when I woke up, the hole was gone. I swear that I broke through the thin rock. There should have been something there, but instead, the earth was just as smooth as the stone around it.

My leg. It looks like a burnt tree trunk. Swollen yet blackened. My skin is hanging off. I tried to wrap some cloth around the wound, but simply touching it brought the pain back. I cannot put any weight on it without being overwhelmed with the burning sensation.

It must have been lava. I fell into some still-dormant pocket. I have no other explanation. I feel feverish from the burn, and I dare not look at it so as not to pass out again.

I tried to go back the way I came, but no matter how far I travel, the thick smog seems to cage me in. I should have made it to the man’s shack by now, yet all around me is blackened land. I do not know where the sun is. I have no sense of direction, and every movement brings back the phantom pain of what once was my leg.

This journal is all I have left. It is the only thing keeping me from going mad. I must keep moving, but to where? The only landmark in sight is the mountain, yet I dare not go towards that place. I will rest, then keep moving.

I saw the ghost.

It was crawling in front of me. Its skin looked like it was on fire, and it had no limbs. The head of the creature was stretched out from the slug-like mass behind it, and its molten skin seemed to drip off and hit the ground below.

I did not wait to see if it noticed me. With the little strength that I had, I ran. Every step on my leg caused pain to grow further up my leg, but I didn’t dare stop. By the time the pain reached my hip, I could go no further. I can still see the ghost from where I sit. I know it grows closer, slow as it is.

The running has made the wound grow worse. My leg is growing blacker, my skin sloughing off until it hangs off the charred muscle. This makes no sense. Johnny said nothing of this in his stories. He talked of ghosts that wailed on the side of Nakai, their skin burning from their final moments in the explosion. But that thing is not human.

It had eyes, black as coal. Even now, I feel them on me.

I cannot go much further. The infection, or burn, or whatever is wrong has spread across my hips. I can only crawl. Each inch sends agony across my entire body. When it spreads higher, I do not think I will be able to write.

The creatures are more common the closer I get to Nakai. They surround me, getting close enough to hear their strangled, quiet moans. Their skin bubbles and pops. Their faces are perpetually melting. The air smells of death.

I think they are trying to talk to me. They say Nakai. Over and over through pained gurgles. Every hour I spend here, I understand them more. In the broken caldera, I see light. It is the only thing that cuts through the blackness. There is no way to go backward. I have screamed my voice raw, but the only response is the tortured song of the melted abominations around me.

I will go a little farther. My feet burn orange. My tears are fire across my skin.

I will leave this book. If you have come this far, you are as doomed as I. If you find me, kill me before I become one of these watchmen of Nakai. Let me die a man. Cease this endless song of the mountain in my head.

If you should ever find yourself in the land of Nakai,

Let every footfall turn your steps from the great mount on high,

For once you see her soldiers ‘cross the rocky face of old,

Prepare to enter the embrace of Mother Nakai’s hold.

And should you run away from her, our lady bathed in red,

Then you shall know the madness of her wrath inside your head.

Through shattered speech and sleepless nights, you help to sing her song,

To bring more to the land of light and join the watchman’s throng.