The Journal of Tay Mouri

This is not meant for you.

I’ll start this off by introducing myself. My name is Tay Mouri. At the time of me starting this journal I am 18 years old. I am a pale tiefling boy with jet black hair, smooth black horns, black eyes with grayish pupils, and a long rat-like tail sprouting from my lower back. I typically wear a ragged and tattered up black in white outfit, with claws on my gloves and boots to assist with climbing. If you saw me, you would think I had all the color sucked from my body and clothes, save for a red cross shaped scar over my right eye, more on that later. 

Not sure why I decided to provide such a comprehensive description of myself in the first entry of this journal, since this is meant for my eyes and my eyes only. If you are reading this now, then I am either dead, captured somewhere, or you’ve gone snooping around somewhere you shouldn’t be. If it’s the latter, then I would urge you to stop now. The contents of these pages are not for the faint of heart, and the knowledge presented is more of a burden than a blessing, as it has been for me. You have been warned. 

As much as I would like to remove myself and my own story from this account, I don’t see any way that could be possible, for this thing seems to be intrinsically linked to me. Essentially, my story and the story of this creature are one in the same, so I’ll start from the beginning. Despite myself being a tiefling, both of my parents, Amelia and Michael Mouri, are both human. In addition, they owned the largest and longest running inn in the kingdom, Mouri Manor. It had been in the family for well over a century and it made my whole family very wealthy. Unfortunately, I could never partake in any of that lifestyle. When I was born and came out as a tiefling, it was quite a shock to my family of humans. My father was so ashamed and disgusted that he separated from my mother, claiming that it was her fault that I came out the way I did and that her blood was tainted in some way. He forced her and myself out of town and took complete ownership of the inn, despite the fact that he was the one who married into the family. 

We were forced from the city of Dawnsburg and into the small town of Duskmire, where my mother attempted to run a smaller inn and tavern, despite being in an area rarely traveled to. Because of how tight money always was, I never had a formal education. Still, I frequented the local library and held onto every book I possibly could to sharpen my mind. I wouldn’t say I really had a childhood at all. Around 12 or 13 I started picking up odd jobs in and around town to send back any extra cash to my mother and the inn. Despite all my research, I could never quite get the hang of magic, so I instead used my natural dexterity and intellect as much as I could. I did all sorts of random jobs, escorts, item retrieval, body guard, pretty much anything if the price was right. 

It was around the time that I started all of this that I started to notice…him. If I was ever down on my luck or a job wasn’t going right, I would see this figure out of the corner of my eye. I rarely got a good glance at him, but he seemed somewhat humanoid, though impossibly tall, around 8 or maybe 9 feet high. He didn’t have any skin or much clothes for that matter, instead his flesh appeared to be made of rotten wood, almost like he had been carved out of a dying tree. The little cloth he did wear was relegated to a red tattered up kilt around his waist, along with several humanoid skulls around his belt. His hands were jagged, ending in sharp thorns like claws. His face was by far the most terrifying aspect, or lack thereof. There was no mouth or nose, or anything of the like. Instead, all he had were 2 deep sockets filled with what seemed like a cobalt flame. Sticking out of the sides of his head were two mangled and branch-like antlers, which were usually the first things I saw. 

 It sounds almost like an old fairy tale when I read it back to myself, but I’m sure that this thing is real. At least I hope it is. The thought that this man made of whicker is just a figment of my own imagination is almost more terrifying than the idea that this is a real entity that stalks me all hours of the day. I can’t quite remember the first time I saw him, maybe just a quick glance at first. But over the years every time I was having an off day or a job didn’t go well or the inn looked like it wouldn’t last another week…there he was. Not moving or swaying in the breeze or anything like that, just standing there, completely still, looking at me with its…eyes? I’ll be honest, I don’t even know if it really has eyes. 

Each encounter I had with this wicker man was brief, though the effects would follow me for days, even weeks to come. I always felt horribly sick right after seeing him, often going into coughing fits and occasionally vomiting, and the mental toll affected me greatly as well. Symptoms often varied, nausea, fatigue, dehydration, dizzy spells, all sorts of things. But the one thing that always followed my encounters, other than the nightmares, was the coughing. It would go on for days, weeks, and be so intense that it felt like I was drowning. In all the books I’ve read, bestiaries, medical textbooks, folklore tales, I have never even found anything somewhat similar to the wicker man. I think that’s what scares me the most, the unknown…

Despite everything I was going through at the time, I was dealing with it quite well, at least I think I was. Other than the occasional encounter with the wicker man, which often left me nearly incapacitated with fear and sickness, I was still doing my odd job contract work and sending back home any spare cash I made to keep the Inn afloat. Even my bouts of sickness after encounters became more bearable, and I was able to just push myself through any discomfort. It was around this time that I started getting hired alongside two adventurers for frequent missions, a human paladin and an elven monk. 

The paladin was named Azure Lightfall, who seemed to take a sort of liking to me right away. I didn’t know much about his background, but I believe he mentioned once that he’d spent some time at an orphanage and sort of became the big brother of the place. I think that’s how he kinda saw me, despite any of my protests. I was 15 at the time, but never really felt like a child, despite my relatively small stature. The monk was named Hendrix. I never really got to know him that well, but he seemed fairly nice. We did some jobs together and worked pretty well as a team, even a few times proposing the idea of forming an adventuring party together. 

 The day started out like any other, just a regular mission with Azure and Hendrix. Honestly, I don’t even remember what the job was. What matters is what happened when I came back home to Duskmire. The small town was completely ransacked. Buildings were burnt, houses were uplifted, people were dead. One peculiar detail though was that a symbol was carved or drawn all over the place. A circle with a cross over it. I felt like I had seen it before, but I couldn’t remember where. 

With fear in my heart, I rushed back to the inn. Luckily, the damage was minimal compared to everything else, but my mom said that these strange people in hoods seemed to be looking for something in the building. What that was, they couldn’t say. I was just relieved to know that my mother was alive and well. 

I assisted with the recovery effort the whole rest of the night, expecting to see the wicker man at any moment. He’d always shown up when I was at my lowest, and this was the lowest of the low. However, the whole night, he didn’t show. I thought that maybe he had finally left me alone. That was until, early in the morning, just before the dawn was about to break, there he was. Standing in the middle of the woods, no trees or bushes to obscure his body, and now I could finally see it. All over his wooden flesh was carved that symbol, the same one that now peppered the streets of Duskmire. I’d finally had it. This thing had been following me, stalking me, for years, possibly my whole life. And now it shows up covered in the symbol that had now been carved throughout the town. 

Something snapped in me and I began to run towards him, pulling out my short sword. My vision became more and more hazy as I approached, and it became hard to run straight, but I kept going. I was going to finally find out what this thing was and what it wanted with me. I jumped and raised my sword, ready to strike and then…

I woke up in the middle of a field just outside of the town, panting as if I had just woken up from a horrible nightmare that I can’t remember. I felt a stinging pain around my right eyes and lifted my hand to it. When I pulled back, I saw blood on my glove. I pulled out my sword and looked into my reflection to see that I had received a cross shaped cut across my right eye. It seemed recent too, still bleeding quite a bit. I tore off a piece of my tunic and held it up to stop the bleeding as I tried to make my way back to town. 

When I arrived, everyone was shocked to see me, my mother especially. I thought maybe I had just been gone a couple hours. Turns out I was gone for 2 weeks, many thought I had died. Oddly enough, even though I had just had an encounter with the wicker man, or at least it felt like I had, I didn’t feel any of the ill effects. In fact, other than the pain in my eye, I felt rather rejuvenated. 

This event changed everything for me. Whereas before I would simply ignore the man, doing my own research that came up with nothing, this motivated me to embark on a new quest. I’m going to find out what this thing was, what he has to do with me, and what happened during those 2 weeks I was gone. I have no memory of that time at all. Still, I have to be secretive about this. I won’t tell anyone about him unless absolutely necessary, and of course I’m still going to take up odd jobs to send money back home to my mother. But I’m going to have my answers, whatever it costs.