Although long have I striven to banish from my mind the memories I recollect from the horrible event and restore to my soul a serenity of an untroubled man, it has all been for naught. As of such, I have come to perceive my quest to obtain the blissful oblivion if not throughly then all but futile an endeavour.

Thus I now seek to put my experience down on paper; albeit the reason for this I know not. Mayhaps I hoped that the paper would absorb some of the terror that overwhelms me in the hours of darkness, and that the ink absorbed the pain of the otherworldly visages I dream of every night after my incident at the derelict family estate. Or it may be that I seek to pass down the written account of my happenings as a warning of the dire threat to everyone who would ever tread the Zültkauss lands.

To the records I know place before You, it may well be that You take a sceptic approach. Perhaps I fail to sufficiently convey the horrendous memories I have or recreate in Your inner eye the full horror of the vistas presented to me; as of such, I must ask of You that You at least try to understand and comprehend the awe and fear that come upon me as I recall the events.

First and foremost, introductions are in order. I was born Jonathan Greene, the least of the many offspring of the honourable late Mister Albert Greene, a pianist of great talent, and the esteemed Madam Emilia Halley, teacher at the local school. As I mentioned, I had a plenty of siblings; envy rarely came between us, and we greatly loved each other. Not often would we be parted, and never for long; for in spite of our differences, our bond was strong, the bond between me and my two sisters and three brothers, all of whom elder to me.

By hard work and great spirit, my father came to be a musical artist of quite some prestige; and as of such, my family was affluent enough to secure a soft childhood and superb education even for me. Always with great astonishment I beheld relics of old and pieces of times past; as a kid, often came upon me dreams of coming to be a archaeologist or other such explorer of matters old. Many years I spent delving into the old lore of my ancestors' dusty tomes and marred books, and from this scholarly seclusion I must surmise came my peculiarities that made many later fashion me an outcast.

The dreams of boyhood are one thing, but growing up, I realised I had yet to find my true calling; past college, I took a few years to travel the world, traverse the lands of many fascinating cultures and behold the remnants of many more. Yet, as I returned to my land of birth, I sensed that the hole of fate I was to fit into was still vacant and hidden from me; thus, I decided to find myself a satisfying job and try settling down.

The job that was mine for the few following years was lucrative, albeit not particularily thrilling. I obtained myself a cosy habitant on Oakley street and for the time being, I enclosed myself in the little haven I had created. It was also then that I came to know my future wife amongst my colleagues, and that we married.

And then struck the disaster. It was there, betwixt the great Alps where we had decided to spend our honeymoon, that descended upon us the most dastardly of mishaps. Alas, it was pure happenstance that my wife had chosen as the sole person to stand on the very balcony that would collapse down into the valley; yet she did, and I was left mourning.

I returned to the home of my parents', only to learn that my father had died. And there we where, my Mother and I, grieving our losses and consoling each other.

It was to be one year from my arrival to my family home when we received a letter from Germany. With great woe and angst we greeted the news of the unfortunate perishing or at least disappearance of my eldest brother, Jacob, whilst visiting an inherited estate in Prussia; for it had been discovered that he, although through the maternal line, was the one of the last male descendants entitled to inherit the Zültkauss lands. For obscure reasons, however, or perhaps due to his characteristic obtuse kindness as he fashioned that the mansion made a great gift for me to spend my days of retirement in- for I k
may not surmise why otherwise should he have had his testament altered, although perhaps now, as light has been spread upon the dark secrets of the place, I understand him more.

And in the memory of my brother, I decided to take the journey to Germany, and to behold with my own eye the building from which once had regally ruled my ancestors. After the most basic of preparations, I bade farewell to Mother and departed for Europe. The journey was uneventful and arriving, I was surprised that not much calamity was about regarding the recent death.

I conversed with the villagers, who explained to me patiently, like to a child, that the place was cursed and no good was to come of stirring it from its slumber, and as of such, my brother had no hope to begin with. I, in my conceitedness, of course dismissed this as superstition and proceeded to investigate my new dwelling. And, in all verity, from the very first sight I knew that there was something amiss...

The Zültkauss lands are uneven and riddled with hills betwixt which lie as scars the sharply angled shady, forested ancient valleys. The Estate stood upon one such hillock, holding its grim reign from the heights of the unwelcoming place. The hillside was not particularily steep, but it was ladden with rocks major and minor, overgrown with thistle and brambles, and warded from the world by a wall in the form of a thick dark copse, with rotting leaves and branches making the ground under my feet treacherous and creating a sense of imminent dread. I could well understand the unsavory legends surrounding the place.

It took me about half on hour to make the trek to the top, and I came out of the woods with a most ghastly appearence, my clothes torn and tiny cuts embellishing my skin. Refusing to be overcome by such minor troubles, I took a rest leaning to one of the mighty walls of the building and steadied my breath.

Turning to face the facade, I was both drawn and repulsed by the venerable estate. Not only did it look derelict and gloomy, it had a look to it that implied enigmas of a darker past. The broken windows stared at me with enmity and forever ajar doors breathed into the sunlight clouds of dust and powder. But in all this I was astonished with the sense of immortality intertwined with death, and fascinated by the promises of the glimpses into the past the locale would offer.

I entered the building, treading carefully among the vapours from beyond our time, admiring the artisanal craftsmanship that had produced these gourgeous examples of baroque architecture. I explored the long, winding hallways that in some befuddling way fit into the small building, and tried the precarious staircases that seemed longer than they were as I climbed their narrow ascent. Although yet the house felt out of place for me, I now had come to feel a sense of assimilation to it, and in stead of fearing what mysteries it offered and hid, I had become a part of them, and a part of the genius loci.

And it was on the second floor, in a small cabinet shrewdly hidden between two rooms larger in stature, that I first observed the Viper. It lay there, displaying not a malign intent as it resided on the cold fireplace. Of course it was no real viper, but one molded of brass with metallurgy most elaborate; indeed, even the smallest of scales was crafted with care and delicacy, and at times it seemed to me as though the creature was eyeing me.

Strangely captured I was by its eyes, and afore I could gather myself,  I found it in my hands.  As not to start doubting my mental stability, I surmised it necessary to investigate the fascinating trinket later on and placed it in my bag with care. I explored the room for further such discoveries, but it was otherwise barren and uninviting.

I wandered the estate for hours, thither when it occured to me that it was darkening outside. As it seemed too late for me to be able to obtain the village inn, I chose instead to spend my night in the abandoned building. Quickly, I found myself an cosy room to start a fire and make my residence in. I lay there, watching the glimmers on the intricate scales of the brass snake that lay before me.

I awoke sometime in the deep of the night, the stars shining cold into my window and the moon spreading its pale touch to ambient. I felt a pull, an urge to make the journey to some unexplainable magnetic spot somewhere below the building. I descended down the staircase with it screeching at me as I carefully picked my step in the dark, ever in the fear thet my path would end in a violent tumble down to my death.

Under the defense of some force unknown to me, I reached the basement unscathed. However, I was denied entrance by a large, solid implacable door of iron in the doorway. I sat there for a few seconds, crestfallen, when it occured to me that it was slightly ajar. Perhaps I could pull it open? Gathering my strength, I heaved and heaved, until the door opened with not a little noise. From beyond came to foul, noxious stenches of decay that set me back for a second,  but at last I found the courage to enter.

Long was this stairway now, not wooden anymore but of stone, and the uneven stones that made me fear tripping seemed to traverse into the very perpetual gloom that lies in the very centre of the Earth. I know not for how long I walked them, between the musty walls in darkness that seemed to even snuffle my lantern, but at last I noticed that the feeble light from my lantern was not the only light around.... indeed, there seemed that from ahead came a glow ever stronger and stronger...

The staircase ended abruptly, winding up in a tunnel or cave of some sort. In the ever greater luminosity of my surroundings, I saw that it became wider by the step, until finally I noticed that the walls to surround me and the ceiling overhead where absent altogether; and that under some uncanny charm that had derived me of proper judgement, I had been brought to a field of some sorts.

It seemed as though a vast sky loomed overhead, albeit my eye spied no stars nor moon; indeed, it was all a malign void that devoured all the light that seemed to emanate from the very ground beneath me. I could hardly fathom how deep underground I may be, and how high above could be the ceiling of this cavern, for a cavern it had to be, could rise.

The soil of this place was strange, dry and dusty, but what I beheld by the glow of those fields was most peculiar; for ahead of me, the ground descended into a lower spot, a hole, and on the sides grew a shambling mass of strange beads of dried plantlike mass that seemed deathly in the pale light. They resembled to me some sort of moss, but in growth they overtook any moss I had beheld, and even many trees. The more it unnerved me that these moss-things swayed wildly, almost as in unnatural dance, although I could not detect the strong gales that should have been tossing them about.

I would have avoided the place with joy, but the strange, inexorable tug inside me urged me to explore this very nether place. I fought it for a short time, but its hold on me was strong and so I found myself striding gaily in the hold amidst the strange growths.

I walked for long and though the hole had seemed perhaps a few kilometres across, I was certain I had walked at least a dozen. It came upon me the realisation that I may be lost in this bizarre place, doomed to forever circle the edge of the hole. Adding to my mental strain was the fact that now I had begun to hear or perhaps sense a timid humming that made the air around me in a way that shivers of fear often overtook me. Furthermore, to my increasing horror, it seemed that this humming was the instrument the moss-things aligned their dance to.

Finally, I came to a dirt path of some sort, although made by who or what I could not imagine. My lantern had died out and thus I trod there, alone and small in the strange glow where strange plants danced a dance that seemed to come from the pristine will of the place I had found myself in. As I proceeded further down the path, a breeze rose as the very breath of this strange underworld to push me on, as though it desired to guide me to the end of the path. The humming intertwined with the quiet hushings of the wind, producing a sharp hiss with a tinge of violence.

The path grew ever narrower and the growths between which I walked ever denser; and soon every step I made they brushed me, and I was repulsed and felt horror, for from up close they were stranger yet to behold; they implied a morbid tinge in the atmosphere, as they seemed like decayed, old bones deprived of mass molded together flapping in the wind.

Then, suddenly, the growths ended. I was on a small clearing, on the side of a small mound, merely more than a bump on the ground. Curious it was that I had not explored it from outside the nether valley. The wind shifted directions and grew in intensity, the hissing now perpetrating my mind. I was trapped in a funnel of wind which whipped at me when I tried to turn back.

Thus, I took the only route available up the mound. I caught in the air a disgusting odour of rotting that wafted from atop the mound. Intrigued of what may lie there to produce such a powerful stench, I laboured onwards.

As I obtained the top of the hill, I at first did not observe its contents, but the world around. Through some strange trick of optics I could not observe the sides of the hole around me, and all seemed as a monotone plain littered with those strange, deathly mosses.

Then I turned to inspect the mound, to find myself afore a sight most ghastly and dreadful. I stood next to the remains of a man, albeit gravely rotten and distorted beyond recognition. I could not seem to discern the reason for the unfortunate fellow's demise, albeit it must have been uncomely, for he had been battered severely with a thing of heavy and hard nature.

One thing about the man caught my I, and as I had knelt down to investigate closer, I was overcome with terror at the conclusion I could draw from my discovery. I sat there, crestfallen at the unsavory demise of such a man and heartbroken at the loss so familiar to me.

Yet, I was not given time to dwell on this for long. The hissing that had retreated as I ascended the mound had returned, and with violent intensity it now pierced my ears. I raises my head and froze on the spot in great fear, for afore me stood a snake, a slithering reptile of twice my size. But now I really doubt my sanity, for the snake seemed exactly the same to the viper that I had in my bag. It eyed me with the same myriad of enmity and hate glittering it its eyes, and the pale luminescence about glittered on its scales just as uncannily.

It lashed out at me, but I reacted and dodged the attack. With vigour born of fear I could not possibly pit on paper, I ran. I sprinted past the mosses and up the slopes of the accursed nether, and made my way to the tunnel with haste I could never make again, unless the shadow of the otherworldly reptile once again dogged at my heels. I plunged into the darkness of the staircase, and scrambled up it on all fours if necessary. Although sore, bloody and hurt as I emerged, my desperate ardour for escape gave me the strength to heave open the great door once again and then slam it shut for good.

Nothing more remember I of this accursed morn, and the villagers found me unconscious from the forest in the noon as they had come to search the ruins of the estate that had collapsed with a crash that shook the valleys and hills and caused great calamity in the village.
No brass viper effigy was found with me or near me, and my ravings I masked for those of a shocked person as not to alarm the villagers.

But I myself cannot dismiss them so easily. I cannot dismiss the memory of the place, the grim, cursed mansion in the grasp of the dark spirit that dwells in the bowels of the earth, who attempted to seize me as I grieved by the corpse of my brother.