Vessel

A Dance With Death

Me, Hornet, and the entire town of Dirtmouth, stormed Grimm's tent. Brumm looked up from his accordion. "Aaah... You're herrrrre... Master will be with youuuuuuuu... shortlyyyyy." He walked away, leaving most of us very confused.

Soon, Grimm made his usual dramatic entrance, appearing in a flash of scarlet flame. "Ah good, I see the little one has consumed the flames. You even brought me a spectacular audience! Really, my friend, you are just too thoughtful." As I contemplated why Grimm wanted an audience, and what they would watch, I turned to look at everyone. They were gone again. "They're already seated" Grimm remarked casually. "Let's not keep our friends waiting, hmm?"

Grimm threw open the curtain doors and stepped out to thunderous applause. I followed close behind, prompting even more applause from the mostly Grimmkin audience. Scattered around the audience, were the rightfully confused citizens of Dirtmouth. When he reached the center of the wide open room, he stopped. "My friends, we are here today, thanks to our friend here. Through his extraordinary efforts, our show continues!" The crowd erupted into applause, save for the citizens. Curth was clapping. He was just happy that everyone else seemed to be happy.

Grimm turned toward me. "My friend, the time has come. The midpoint of your quest is to be quite the hill to climb. Now then, dance with me, my friend. Prove to our audience that you are worthy of a starring role in our finale!" Oh yeah. That's why he wanted an audience. FU-

Grimm bowed, as he normally does. With seemingly no other option, I bowed back. I realized what was likely at stake in this fight. I wouldn't let him harm my friends. A furious anger awoke within me. Grimm would pay for all of the suffering he had caused.

Suddenly, Grimm's theme from the game actually started playing. Looking around, I noticed the orchestra of bugs that all looked like Brumm. Ok. That was impressive, I'll give him that.

Grimm launched across the room, swinging a claw. Raising my blade, I discovered that the tips of Grimm's clawed hands were metallic, and with some effort, I was able to push him back.

I started my own offensive. A swipe to the legs prompted a massive leap from Grimm, who erupted into several great balls of fire. He reappeared and thrust his cape into the ground, prompting spikes to grow and rush toward me. Leaping aside, I tried to slash at him again.

Grimm caught my sword arm and tossed me across the arena. Standing up, I tried to fight him again. He sent his bats after me. These bats were apparently incapable of turning and crashed into the wall, exploding into the scarlet flame they were made of. A sidestroke prompted Grimm to take a step back, and he continued this pattern for the attacks that followed.

Soon he grew tired of this and once again caught my sword arm. I desperately tried to punch him with my free hand, but he caught that too. He then fell on his back and used both feet to kick me away. "My, my, your teacher has put a lot into your training. It's a shame, the two of you are so alike."

Now I understood why I was losing so spectacularly. Hornet had trained me and now we had the same fighting style. As well as this, we shared the same weakness. Anger makes our fighting sloppier. There was only one way that I could win this fight. I had to calm down.

Grimm rushed forward, claw outstretched, ready to strike me down. I focused on his movements, pushing everything at stake to the back of my mind. Grimm was powerful. Defeating him would be no easy task. He only had one weakness. He was incredibly predictable.

I sidestepped the attack, throwing my nail into the soft dirt beneath my feet. Grimm seemed surprised, before continuing his assault. He couldn't connect a single blow. Sidestep, backstep, hop, sidestep. Grimm was growing angrier with each swing and miss. He swiped sideways, too high to jump over. I slid under his arm, stopping right by my weapon which I had stabbed into the ground.

As I drew my weapon, Grimm flashed an emotion in his eyes that I hadn't known him to possess; fear. This quickly turned to fury, as he leapt into the air and puffed up his cloak. The now spiky, pufferfish Grimm, began to shoot out several dozen fireballs from every angle.

With as much concentration as I could muster with the firestorm swirling around me, I steadied my arm. I took aim at Grimm.

I charged forward. Grimm furiously redirected his efforts toward me. I dodged a few fireballs, before I was forced to leap over one. Midair, I locked onto Grimm. I threw my nail. Grimm's eyes widened as the nail rushed towards him. He desperately tried to evade the projectile. My nail pierced straight through his cloak, prompting a screech, and the disastrous end of Grimm's theme, as his orchestra erupted into chaos.

Grimm tried to get up, off the ground. "That..." he began. "That... WAS TRULY SPECTACULAR!!" Grimm stood and handed me my nail. "My, my, an excellent performance my friend. Look at the crowd! They loved it!" He was right. The crowd had erupted into thunderous applause, even a standing ovation. Granted they had no legs, but at least they were trying.

Yet there was still one question that remained. How had Grimm survived? As if he had read my mind, Grimm answered. "You seem confused by my survival. The nail simply pierced my cloak. I'll need a new one, but I can afford that."

I walked into the stands to meet my friends. The nightmare (pun 100% intended) was over. We started to leave the tent, but Grimm called out to us. "Leaving so soon? Well I guess you would be eager to finish your quest. Defeat the three nightmares, allow the child to consume the flames, and return to me. Brumm will provide your final instructions when you return." With a flash of scarlet flame, Grimm was gone. And we were still on the hook.

Well that's it for this chapter! I had a lot of fun writing this one, so I hope you enjoyed it. If you have any ideas, let me know! Or, if you have a theory of some kind, just dm me and ask! Thank you again for reading, and I'll see you in the next chapter!

P.S. Once the Grimm storyline is finished, I'll be taking a break from Vessel to write my new story. I'll reveal more about it the closer I get to it's release, but I will outright say, it's not related to Hollow Knight in any way. This new story will be set in the universe of "The Legend of Zelda, Breath of the Wild" which I picked up relatively recently, and greatly enjoyed. I'm looking forward to it, and as much as I hope you are too, I understand if it's not quite what you're looking for. Don't worry. I'm not done with the world of Hollow Knight either.