Reappearing in the little of what remained of Yuggoth, I mentally pinged the Blackstone Fortresses to see their states. And from the looks of it, it wasn't good, to say the least, but it was even less surprising.
Every energy in their storage was used to fire at me, to eradicate what I did not desire in a cataclysmic explosion. Now, they were comparable to massive ebony black molten slag. None of the elegant flower-like designs remained or much of their function.
But that was no reason to leave them here for filthy Daemons to infest, and I didn't want to give them away. They were MINES and MINES alone.
Extending a hand, I grasped every last of them in telekinesis, turning off what could be turned off for ease of motion. I wouldn't want to rip apart what fraction of the hyper-massive structures' salvageable parts were still here.
I waved another of my six hands, and its ring popped up and expanded massively, but it wouldn't be enough to fit what amounted to a small planetoid-sized spacecraft, nevertheless hundreds of many shapes. But it was nothing a snap of a finger size manipulation can't fix.
Magic was fabulous—mine, above all else.
I deposited them in the most secure confine of my Vault, a decontamination and isolation room of sorts. The memetic radiation and various frequencies they were emitting would prove damaging to the rest of my collection.
Prevention was the mother of safety.
This done, all my talons flew back to me and sheathed themselves in their socket, my face contorting in pain for the briefest of moments. Moments that made the baleful gazes of fear, anger, disgust, and confusion in the Warp shift to amusement and satisfaction, but my glare shimmered their open aggression down to their place.
They were weak.
The Abyss wasn't them; they should be careful to whom they gaze. For now, they were in luck. I had more pressing matters.
I was wounded, and my time here didn't calm me down one bit—the exact opposite.
My initial plan when I regained my freedom had been cut and dry. It was inspired by what the C'tan intended. It amounted to the temporary isolation of the psychic ocean from physical space.
A lengthy, if uncomplicated, process. Of course, distancing all of the Warp was unwanted since it would kill my little bats and space elves, among others. It was an omnicide. But beyond those unique cases, life needed to be wiped out for a clean slate.
In principle, it would have worked, but it changed with the fissure on the Well of Eternity done by the bitch that was 'Mother,' may her non-existent soul suffer evermore. This factoid made this plan… futile in its ultimate purpose. It was why the Chaos Gods were so influential despite the barrier Asuryan raised; they were feeding off outside sources, other universes.
The last point remained a theory, but it had enough evidence to be considered at face value.
It wasn't the end and be all, but it complicated the matter to an uncomfortable degree.
And now, something from these other sides was tied to me. I was an anchor, rendering the sealing of the Well of Eternity virtually impossible as well unless I wished to opt for suicide.
Suppose I held the raw power to do so, to begin with, to make it happen without it being a massive failure. The fissure was in Tzeentch's backyard, where he was strongest, and isolating his realm wouldn't be an easy feat.
It was infuriating, annoying, and beyond. But I was severely wounded–I played the piñata for my win–my wards and seals currently on myself could only hold on for so long. I couldn't keep them eternally. Khaine blade did not exclusively touch Slaanesh. I-he took the brunt of the damage, but alas, I didn't go unscathed from it.
Khaine hadn't been surgical in his strike.
Still, it was manageable, just that fighting the Tumors was unwise, even if they were unwell from my attack. Fighting them without preparation was equally reckless.
I was stuck between a rock and a hard place, but on the other hand… so were the three little shits. Oh, the hole I made was a problem, but that could be dealt with later. Neverborns–Daemons, Chaos Gods, etc–were entities unable to continually exist in Realspace without constant contact with psychic energy per their total preternatural nature.
At worst, they made a perfectly destroyable stronghold. Aeldari Gods were more grounded, and that's why we just don't stop existing under psionic nullification fields. In exchange, we couldn't grasp as much of the Warp as the Chaos Gods did. Also, it was what gave us true sapience. We weren't disorganized conglomerates of emotions and concepts.
Well, unless what was tried and partially succeeded on me. And with my portals, I could make the Immaterium permanently part of the Materium anywhere and everywhere. Within the Milky Way, outside galaxies were another context but not an impossibility. The locks weren't exclusively on hurting my 'Master'; fleeing out of telepathic range was part of the leash.
The anti-psychic field I used for my false death was just a loophole since I was specifically made to be operational inside.
Regardless, this wasn't important.
I was just pissed off.
My pent-up aggression needed to go somewhere… and the mortals that have played ample hands in my fate, my would-be prison, were not as complicated to handle.
A maniacal grin formed on my face, fangs lengthening at countless terrific ideas bouncing in my head like thousands of pinballs.
"This promises to be fun."
Of course, the entire affair relating to four of my siblings escaping the Celestian Enclave was in my mind, but that was for later. I needed to be in tip-top shape for them, and it wasn't as if I couldn't blockade them for the moment.
I had extensive control of the Labyrinthine Dimension, after all, and deep within it, I sensed the ones that had played with force they shouldn't have.
•••••
Upon a throne of pallid skin and moaning flesh was an equally pale man. His sharp ears parted his flowing dark hair, putting emphasis on his visage, a face that would vanish in a crowd. One that sported a look of loss and confusion.
His bright black eyes with hidden power coiling behind studied the endless sea of buildings that was Dark City known as Commoraggh from its highest viewpoint. Vileth, Cardinal Gospel, Head of the Dark Muse, felt no satisfaction in his success.
He had sensed the horrifically violent and sudden disappearance of the majority of the Aeldari Empire population in the location he commanded them to go. It was the culmination of his life work, his vengeance manifesting to false Gods undeserving of existence.
The Dark Muse was old, older than any mortal, old enough to remember the legendary and mythical Old Ones, their divine creators, and their demise… one orchestrated by these traitorous creatures.
And traitorous creatures they proved themselves to be as soon after the decimation of the Old Ones, the Bloody Handed God–Kaela Mensha Khaine–had chosen for them to exist no more. Then, these beings abandoned them.
Or what Vileth has kept, the fuel of origination from which his burning passion stemmed. His soul couldn't contain eons upon eons of information without collapsing in itself–apotheosis was rendered impossible, and he did not wish for such, to be part of these lowly parasites–and naught of value was lost.
Yet before the Seas of Souls was stolen from the Aeldari, the one that had saved him from the God of Murder's burning blade had been a source of great information equaled in its confusion. The Dark Muse never trusted the avian Neverborn capable of fits of farsight eclipsing the greatest Aeldari seers, but it was the only way forward for change to happen.
It wasn't a matter of rationality.
And now Vileth had succeeded, the Gods had died, and She-Who-Thirst was born from their ash. He didn't sense their pungent psychic presence anymore, had the confirmation from the blue avian of their demise, and the tug upon his souls to be devoured was clear even from the mighty defense he and his fellow Dark Muses had raised till the galaxy quieted down.
Yet the Dark Muse felt empty. There was no satisfaction. No joy or elation. Nothing. For the first time, the weight of time became real, and all amounted to a void. Long since had he forgotten his mother, his father, his sisters, his brothers, the planet on which he was born.
Nothing.
Vileth had power in every form beyond the dream of many, yet nothing brought the embers of life he recently lost at this facsimile of a victory. Regret began to blossom at his hesitation–his fear–to join the Fall of the Olds and the Rise of the New, to abandon everything of the shell that he was.
"Tha-" His eyes widened, and his mouth hung open as in the center of his vision, a golden ring expanded, the liquid-like portal made of constellations widening.
The Dark Muse's heart hammered in his chest, almost to the point of bursting, as something floated down the portal that had shattered any defense of the Dark City. An alarm rang across the endless seas of buildings, from its darkest layer to its ether, but none of the defenses went on to do their purpose. The same was true for the defensive force, but in their case, they were too entranced to move.
The arrow-shaped tip of a skinned and purple-furred tail came out first. They were feet shaped like strange shoes with curled-up tips and, soon after, muscular legs, a bulky monstrous torso adorned with six rings. Then, one by one came disembodied hands until they numbered six, each orbiting a different axis around the creature, imitating the motion of moons to the gravitational pull of a forming planet
Finally, the head came out, a clean, if bushy purple beard on a grey-skinned visage smirking wider than it ever had any right to be, a dark beak merging with the upper mandible shifting with the smile. Two massive horns grew from the side of its head while none of the hair–of a similar color to the beard–was free, taking the form of a top knot held by a golden ring.
But it was the eyes… depthless pool of magenta with two golden rings shining brighter than any metal or gemstones.
It was beautiful. The most beautiful creature the ancient Aeldari had ever gazed upon, genuine tears of awe flowed freely at such a magnificent being.
His hand extended to grasp the gargantuan being. His body instinctively stood up from his throne to the grand wraithbone window.
Yet, it was terrifying on an existential level.
These were more than predatory. Oh, far more.
The eyes held naught but malice, rage, hate, sadistic anticipation, ravenous lust, and violence, yet very much intelligent. It reminded the Cardinal Gospel of the Daemon that had saved his life–an unnatural act to the highest degree–that had made me feel so small, unimportant, and less.
Yet, in that instant, it dwarfed it all.
"No…" He whispered, the tug in his soul growing stronger and stronger by the seconds as the being, the God, the Devil, gazed at him, its fanged maws splitting wider in a tunnel of spinning teeth.
-YeS~!- Came the melodic voice in his mind, barely at a level to cause agony yet keep his soul healthy, the hunger within palpable, tasting his entire metaphysical being. One word. One word and he would die in the truest of the senses. One word was all it would take to cease his existence.
He felt fear. Incomprehensibly deep fear as realization dawned on him. But he remained frozen, unable to scream, to run, to cry, or anything of that fashion.
•••••
I stared at the scared shitless male Aeldari, my smile creeping higher by the second.
-yOU~!- I spoke in his fragile mind, and that was a generous wording. It was fragmented, heavily modified, and understandingly so for such an old specimen. Aeldari weren't made to live for this long—a case to study later after I had my fun. I wanted to devour them, but that wasn't wise. It would be laughably simple, but no. I wouldn't; it was a downward spiral, not that I wouldn't snack on some, but a bit of moderation was necessary.
-OBsReve~!- I sang, keeping eye contact with him, a Dark Muse and the Dark Muse, the first of those pests that have made me. I understood they were puppets; Vileth's soul was an open book to me, but they weren't stupid.
The last part of this Tzeentch was a naughty lie but was surprisingly honest otherwise on average. A significant portion of the memories were altered and lost forever, but it was more than sufficient to know he was aware. Misguided or not, it changed little. I never was particularly merciful, and mercy was a resource I was poor at at this instant.
"May you lowly pests be granted my blessing." I intoned grandly, my hands stopping spinning as six pentagrams appeared. The dimension and sub-dimensions of this fraction of the Labyrinthine Dimension rippled, and every structure turned to dust before vanishing.
My immediate focus was on Lhilitu, the arrogantly titled Consort of Void. From a glance, I understood everything about her, her desire, fear, and all that was between those and after.
She was as aroused as she was frightened. Quite a lot. A disgusting slut was all she was. There was no limit to reaching the panacea of pleasure for her.
Torturing her in the classical manner would prove counterproductive on that point. But that would have been boring, and I didn't feel the urge to respect the integrity of her identity, though I guess she wasn't terribly against that… for now.
She was the most foolish of the seven, and I will demonstrate it live to the trillion here.
"Let the spectacle begin~!" I exclaimed in a sing-song tone.
Hello, there goes the would be Dark Eldar. They angered a God they shouldn't and now they were rendered to nothingness.
Bye-bye!
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