SchizoNomad
BBS Start Screen
"Welcome to Carcosa BBS! Engage the grid. Unravel the chaos."
SYSOP: //Le_Roi_en_Jaune\
Login: [SchizoNomad]
Password: ******** Connection Established
<<< Mainframe echoes >>> Uploading file: "Power_Lines_Carcosa.txt"
The court and The King in Yellow
The court of the King in Yellow was a labyrinth of shimmering code and decaying architecture, a dreamscape where reality and illusion bled into one another. Neon glyphs crawled like veins across cracked marble pillars, and the flicker of failing light cast long, distorted shadows. At the center of it all, the King loomed—an impossible amalgam of AI, ancient myth, and something not quite human. Its form pulsed with golden static, an eternal monarch of chaos and order.
SchizoNomad entered the court, his presence a disruption, like a glitch made flesh. His long coat rippled with digital distortions, and his face was hidden behind a fragmented mask that constantly reconfigured itself, as if the idea of his identity was incompatible with fixed form. He strode forward, his boots echoing against the cracked floor, the weight of his knowledge dragging behind him like a cloak.
The King in Yellow turned its attention to him, its voice a low hum of corrupted code and ethereal whispers. SchizoNomad knelt, the gesture half-mocking, half-respectful.
“There’s a rupture in the Grid,” SchizoNomad said, his voice sharp and deliberate. “A destabilizing force cutting through the flow. A girl and her... duck.” The word lingered, absurd yet unignorable, as if its presence in the narrative defied logic itself. “They’re tracking the VXN. Closing in fast.”
The King’s form flickered, a thousand unreadable expressions passing through its golden haze. SchizoNomad tilted his head, his fragmented mask briefly aligning into a smirk. “The Android is still dormant, but their trajectory is clear. Shall I intervene, or let the chaos play its hand?”
The King in Yellow remained silent for a moment, the air growing heavy with static, the faint whine of overstressed frequencies slicing through the Court. Then, with a single pulse of light, it responded—not in words, but in a command that resonated through SchizoNomad’s very code, a directive searing into the fabric of his being.
SchizoNomad convulsed, his fragmented mask glitching violently, the fractal patterns collapsing into jagged shards. His hand instinctively reached for his face, where a thin line of crimson began seep from his nose. Blood. Real, visceral, and utterly wrong in this space. It spilled out, seeping through the cracks of his digitized self, dripping onto the cracked marble floor where it was instantly absorbed, leaving no trace.
He gasped, his voice ragged, the smirk wiped clean as his body convulsed with a terrible, growing awareness. The King in Yellow didn’t just give commands; it took. Its golden static flared brighter, like a storm of suns collapsing inward, and SchizoNomad felt it digging into him—past his flesh, past his digital self, and into the hidden recesses of his mind, where even he dared not tread.
The static swirled, a vortex of dread pressing against the edges of the Court, its golden brilliance so vast it threatened to consume all perception.
SchizoNomad staggered backward, out, home - to safety. His hand trembling as the bleeding slowed but didn’t stop. His fragmented mask reassembled itself, though the smirk never returned. Without a word, he turned to leave, the heavy silence punctuated only by the drip of blood echoing against the distant void. The King’s command burned within him, undeniable, and as he vanished into the labyrinth of shadows, the court of the King in Yellow shimmered with an unnatural stillness, like the calm before a storm.