AN Abergavenny man who got in over his head with a necromancer in the Forest of Dean is warning readers not to dabble in the dark arts if they value both their sanity and soul.

“I always thought magic was harmless fun,” explained semi-professional long-distance runner Johnny Turnip. “I mean, everyone loves Mary Poppins and getting the Ouija board out at drunken parties. But after meeting a real-life wizard who could make all sorts of crazy crap happen, I think if I was to watch an old Paul Daniels card trick on YouTube now I’d lose my mind! That’s how much the occult has wounded me!”

Turnip explained that he was attacked with black magic after heading to the Forest of Dean with his two friends on an illegal boar hunt. After their van crashed they met an old man in the woods who called himself Indiana Jenkins. Indy warned them that only a fool born of an idiot would kill a pig in that part of the woods without the necromancer’s permission.

Agreeing that they were no fools, Turnip, Big Tony, and Puerto Rico Paul agreed to follow Indy to the Lonely Cottage and get “the magic man’s blessing.”

“Indy said the necromancer’s house was only three miles away, but when your hungover and exhausted those three miles can seem like three hundred,” explained Turnip. “Puerto Rico Paul began to whinge like a right ponce, particularly when he got a little bit of mud on his red tracksuit. At one point Big Tony threatened to tear Paul's tongue out and eat it, but Paul loses all sense of concern for his own safety when his wardrobe has been compromised. He’s always been a well-dressed man around town and the thought of looking like a common rambler was destroying him.

“Indy lifted our spirits when he suddenly began singing. ‘I’ve been working on the railroad.’ The song instantly struck a chord with us. We used to sing it in job club every morning before they tried to teach us how to turn a computer on, type our names, and send an email.”

Turnip added, “As we chanted and marched through dense woodland where no bird sang, or sun shone, we came to a clearing of sorts beneath grey slate skies, where a quaint and lonely stone cottage stood like a beacon of hope.”

Turnip added, “I realised then that the closer I got to the Lonely Cottage the more my thoughts began to sound a bit fanciful and poetic. It was like I was one of those dungeons and dragons kids you used to see everywhere growing up in the 1980s.

“I remember that Indy had warned us to be on our guard because as we drew nearer to the necromancer’s lair, his influence would effect us in different ways.

“To my horror, Big Tony suddenly fell to all fours and began growling and barking like a mad dog. Disgusted by my friend’s lack of restraint in the face of some common black magic I was about to shout, “Behave you tool You’re from Mardy, not Abersychan!’ But instead, I cried in a strange voice, ‘Oh pitiful creature. Your civilised tongue and cultured ways have been rendered obsolete by the wilderness. Your flimsy facade has been cast aside and the woods now bear witness to the inarticulate rage of the eternal beast within.’”

Turnip added, “As these strange words left my mouth I felt little more than a puppet on a string. To make matters worse, at the same time Big Tony was doing his German Shepard impression, Puerto Rico Paul began doing that weird river dance thing all the Irish love and manically singing the ‘I’m a little teapot’ nursery rhyme.

“Meanwhile Indy had taken to doing some extreme yoga moves and seemed to be softly advising an audience only he could see that, ‘The secret to my flexibility lies within my spirituality.’”

Turnip recalled, “As I surveyed the wreckage of what my friends had become, my mind recoiled in horror from the brink of some unfathomable abyss and to make matters worse I felt like I’d been choked to death with the collected works of the romantic poets and been reborn as some Shakespearean tart. My mind was unravelling and the only flicker of light in this endless night lay in my backpack.”

Turnip explained that resisting the urge to wax lyrical about the contour and colour of a nearby leaf he manfully pulled a bottle of whiskey out of his backpack before taking a huge gulp.

He explained, “I knew from past experiences with acid that hard alcohol can always counter a bad trip, and hopefully if I numbed my mind and dulled my wits enough the necromancer’s sorcery wouldn’t work on me.

Turnip said, “After I had polished off about half a bottle I could feel equilibrium being restored. And although everyone else was still acting like dick heads, my mind was completely shut off from both reality and enchantments. I was in a world of my own and the wizard could no longer get in.”

Turnip added, “As my senses cleared I noticed his Lonely Cottage was little more than one of those garden cabin office jobs that became popular during Covid. There was even what looked like a garden gnome in front of the sliding door.

“As Big Tony continued to bark, Indy put his body in positions you wouldn’t think possible and Puerto Rico Paul acted like a hyperactive leprechaun on speed, I rung the video doorbell and shouted, ‘The game’s up necromancer, I’ve got your card marked, and it’s not the ace of spades, it’s the joker. We’ve come here to ask your permission to kill some pigs, and I don’t take kindly to you playing your CIA mind games with us. Now let’s talk man to magician about how we can hunt us some boar without you acting like a stroppy sorcerer.”

Turnip said, “As the necromancer suddenly appeared from behind a puff of smoke caused by his girly vape, I had a sinking feeling that things would get a lot worse before they got better!”

To be continued.......