Chapter 11

 Eldritch Corruption: Environment

https://archiveofourown.org/works/20857010/chapters/53688574

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Rot.

 Ruin.

 The dank and the horror, the corruption and the disease.

 All dwelt in the dark, in the fetid waters and the festering muck, the moldering garbage and the hollow bones of what was once civilization.

 Waterfall was not what it once was.

 The limestone tunnels and vast rivers, crystal caverns and whispering flora, were once the jewel of the Underground. Beauty and peace lived in its cool, clear waters, serenity in its meandering paths, calm and contentment in its quiet, the music of the rain.

 It was a place of majesty, and well adored.

 No longer.

 The light has gone from the crystalline stars that once lit its tunnels and caves, its homes and shops, the scenic vistas and parks and cities. The creeping shadow stole them all away, and left the denizens of the waters blind and starving, the plant life shrinking and the monsters ripping the stones from the walls in an attempt to consume them.

 Many perished in the first few months, starving in the eternal night until they were no more. Many more were lost in their attempts to flee, drowned by the rising, filth clogged swamp, the dusty river, the foulness of the compounding garbage falling from above.

 The rest adapted, and though what they became could not be called living, they survived. They strove on, against the call of nature and the will of the stars; they changed, the dark no longer their enemy, but their friend and ally.

 Undyne strove for glory no longer, a hunter of the worst kind, prowling the deep endlessly. Temkind transformed into blind horrors, slavering for meat and desperate for destruction. Mad Dummy consumed everything in its path, regardless of what. Onion-san cared for nothing but the flow of blood and the shatter of bones, Shyren drowned those unlucky enough to hear her song, Moldbygg devoured any that came close enough to spring their traps.

 Deep in the swamp, gorging on its vile waters and any fool enough to wander too deep into the dark, a beast dwelled in the impassable depths of its own misery, awaiting its death and that of all those around it.

 The flora mutated as well, the whisper of voices in the shadows a danger untold and the rustling of vegetation the only warning prey would receive…

 And above it all, the fall of the rain, swelling the deep and making music no more… singing only of rot and ruin and the end of the world.