Desolate Shrine – Deliverance From the Godless Void

Band – Desolate Shrine

Album – Deliverance from the Godless Void

Country of Origin – Finland

Genre – Death Metal

Release Date – November 10, 2017

Label – Dark Descent Records

Author – The Great Mackintosh

You have journeyed long and hard. The trek has been tiresome, and you have lost many a companion on this fool’s errand. You bought them all for the princely sum of around thirty pieces of silver, and told them all that once they reached the site you were after, there would be proof of your own beliefs.

Now all that remains is you. They paid for your insistence with their very lives, but you rationale their deaths by believing they have gone somewhere better, and it keeps you moving forward. It has to be here. The maps you carry tell you so. The voice in your head tells you so. Forward, ever forward. You have begun to hear things, and you tell yourself that it is just because you are tired.

So tired. You lay down your pack and rest your weary head for a moment as the sun begins to set. Staring into nothing, you neatly file away all of your choices in your head. After all, bringing them along with you was not a betrayal of any kind, and they are in a better place. You keep saying this until your attention is drawn elsewhere.

A single star, brighter than anything you have seen before seems to beckon. This is a sign surely. You rise, grab your kit and head towards this unseemingly bright object, all feelings of exertion suddenly gone, the turmoil of the recent past erased from your mind. This is it. This is a sign from the heavens and follow you must.

Cresting a hill you see it, bathed in an unearthly glow. The shrine that somehow has eluded you until this moment. That star, the very star that surely led others to your saviour lighting the dusty path before you. Trepidation starts to creep into your mind, and those things you heard earlier begin to become clearer. Are they voices?

You cannot doubt. This is your time, your chance to prove that you were right and it was all worth it. Kicking up clouds of grey dust you march towards the doors of this vast mausoleum with the utter assurance that your deity is with you, protecting you. After all it was he who gave you this quest wasn’t it. You remember.

‘Prove to the world that I exist,’ you heard in your own head. Now standing in front of mahogany doors carved with such intricacy that beggars belief, the voices get louder. Spectral and thin, not quite what you thought an angel may sound like. ‘What do I know?’ you say, because the light has led me here and I am it’s servant.

You look for a handle, or some way of entry, but you cannot find it. Perplexed, you begin to pray for guidance. ‘Please help me oh great one. Your servant who has sacrificed so much, pledged his very soul to you needs your help.’ The voices grow louder and louder. You begin to feel fear, and then without a sound the doors open and the voices stop.

In front of you, behind those doors of such magnificence, is utter darkness. You search through your belongings and find what must be your last match. There are some rags on the ground that look a little like corpse dressings, but you grab them anyway. All you need now is a branch or something to wrap this around.

There is a bone nearby, and you recoil as you touch it, just a slight flinch. Maybe it belonged to another pilgrim who couldn’t find a way to get in. Never mind. You reach into your provisions and grab that little bottle of oil that is almost empty and pour the remnants on the rags.

Ah light. Glorious light, and for the first time you actually look around you. Bones, bones everywhere, and the dust at your feet looks more like ash. Why did so many die to get into here? They must have been unworthy. I shall be the one to make this great discovery. Me and me alone.

The threshold beckons, and you walk in. The light of the torch you have so cleverly created begins to show you glimpses of the walls in this seemingly abandoned relic of a building. You approach one and cannot believe what you are seeing. Carvings from stick figures to works of art, all seem to involve the same theme.

Death. Ways of dying that you had never even thought of. Cruel, horrible, vicious ways of leaving those we love behind. And the voices, those spectral voices rise again. Fear becomes paramount and you run back to the doors from whence you came. They are still shut. How to open them, you think, as the voices get louder and louder.

And suddenly, a foul breath extinguishes your only source of light. It is now you against the dark. Your god has abandoned you. There is nothing but the darkness and the realisation that the void is all encompassing.

You see nothing as bony hands drag you down. Your soul has already been sold. It matters not to them.

Long winded stories aside, and blackened references duly noted, have at least some faith in me that this is good. Oh so good.

Recommendation: Endless suffering awaits you in the void, just go with it.

Rating: 4/5