บท 48: Chapter Twenty-Two: Rising from the Ashes (Part III)
Enuncia is the first language. Once, it was like any other, a method of conveying meaning between beings and spoken by the first sentients to touch the Warp. As these first-born dived into the Sea of Souls and mastered it, they encountered the Wellspring, the place where everything and anything originates from. Secrets were uncovered and the first attempt to master the Immaterium occured. Drinking from the Well of Eternity, the Old Ones gained a power beyond comprehension. They gained the power to impose their will on the cosmos, to dominate and enforce their sanity and will upon the sea of souls.
Whereas their successors anointed singular beings to master and bridge the surface and deeps, the Old Ones bound the power of God-Calling to their language. Enuncia is the Old Ones God-Caller and the very first instance of the Anathema. It was a language that can overwrite reality. A word spoken in it becomes real and powerful beyond compare. Those with the strength and knowledge can wield it, but at a terrible price. Every use was dangerous to the user, for it called upon the universe itself and forcing it to change. The more powerful and complex the order, the greater the price. The Old Ones would burn out entire bodies and lifespans singing songs of creation and destruction to alter existence.
Cegorach had turned a human child into his prophet and weapon, teaching her a single word of Enuncia. He taught her the most powerful and feared single utterance in the God-Language, the word for Death/End/Doom/Extinction/Erase/Delete. The prophet should not have survived such knowledge, her body and mind crushed under the universes mechanisms. This was the purpose of this temple and religion; to keep the prophet alive and working, containing that Word until she could play her part.
The Emperor of Mankind moved at speeds that defied physics and reason, arcane knowledge and incalculable warp power racing against what was about to occur. For all his ability and skill, it was not enough. The moment the Prophet's mouth spat forth that impossible word, death struck. Enuncia speaks to the universe, and the universe answers. The Prophet said the Emperor was dead, and the cosmos rewrote itself to signify that truth. Existence itself started to shift, erasing the Master of Mankind.
Atham felt it, a great swell of space/time. His very molecules started to fade, individual atoms melting into nothingness. When he was born, the Emperor had been etched into the Warp. His very existence burned into the universe. Those long dead Shamans and their immaterial allies had touched the Well of Eternity and embedded its power into mankind, birthing a God-Caller who could call upon the power of both realms enforce mankind's sanity upon both. The body born in ancient Anatolia held this power and guided humanity. Now that vessel of flesh and light was being destroyed.
Horror filled Iskandar as he watched chunks of his father's flesh and armor dissolve into the void. Both Primarch and Captain General charged to protect the Emperor. Iskandar was faster and reached out to seize the rapidly dissolving Anathema. One moment his arm was coated in byzintine purple armor and touching the Emperor's shoulder, the next it was gone. Iskandar screamed in horror as a bloody stump nearly reaching his shoulder appeared. Nearly half the Emperor's body and Iskandar's arm was gone, leaving gaping wounds that grew with each second. Frantically the Emperor swung his remaining hand and with a wave of telekinetic force pushed his son and his bodyguard away, protecting them both from doom.
Grasping at air and flickering with warpfire, the Emperor looked into Iskandar's eyes. The Emperor had been fast enough, his son had only lost an arm. Desperately, he conveyed what might be his last piece of wisdom before he vanished. "Iskandar, my son, you are not a Serpent. You are a phoenix. A phoenix, Iskandar! Rise, rise from the ashes!"
With those frantic words, a blast of golden light erupted from the Emperor's wounds. The Master of Mankind was fighting for his life. Cegorach had caught him by surprise and used an impossible weapon. Why the damnable clown-god would do this would be discovered. For now, Atham simply struggled to survive. Golden power encircled his flesh and halted the advancing erasure. Such a curse could ruin the Emperor's flesh, but not his soul or mind. Such a thing was powerful beyond reason, branded into the universe just as Enuncia was. The Emperor could survive without a body, but such a fate would be worse than death. Unanchored in the Materium, he could become something far greater and more terrible.
Such a fate would not stand. The Emperor carried a million years of human history. He would not allow himself to become like the God-Emperor or worse. Eununcia was a form of God-Calling, gone diluted and feral without its original masters. The Emperor was not hampered by such things. The full might of humanity was his. With herculean effort, the Emperor pushed against the tide of restructuring reality. Space/time itself worked to erase his body, but such petty things would not stop him. With enormous willpower, Atham the Revelation fought for each individual molecule, enforcing his will on the universe itself and keeping atomic bonds together through sheer strength.
As the Emperor struggled to preserve and rebuild his flesh, the temple around the Imperial party cracked. Iskandar frantically looked around, watching the crystal heart shatter before them. A black burn mark covering the Altar wall was all that remained of the Prophet. Her body and soul were reduced to nothing, leaving a stain that perfectly formed the sigil of Cegorach. The monks had also been killed, bodies simply ceasing to function as the Enuncian curse started. A thing of such total death was too much for an unaugmented human mind and body. Even when not focused on them, the shockwaves snuffed the life from the monks. Astartes and Custodes are made of sterner stuff. It rattled, but not hurt Mankind's defenders.
The Primarch centered himself and closed his wound, biomancy squeezing arteries shut and dulling his screaming nerves. Disoriented and scared, Iskandar unsheathed his sword and collected himself. Valdor was ahead of him, quickly giving commands to the Companions. A squad of Custodes lifted the Emperor's body between them on a litter of shields. They would escape this world and return to the Bucephalus. There, the Emperor could heal.
Valdor shouted orders and Voxed the frigate to teleport them offworld, but the psychic interference was too great. The temple's collapse and the Emperor's struggles thrashed through the Warp and made it to where another method into orbit was required. Iskandar sent some of his sons to scout ahead, clearing the path for the Custodes. A slight motion caught the Primarchs eye and he spun face it, blade in remaining hand. One of the monks had stood up, a sharp hunk of fractured crystal grasped in its hand. Faster than any human should be able to move, the monk lept at Iskandar moving with inhuman grace and poise. Atom-sharp adamantium cleaved the monk's head from his shoulders. Iskandar had lashed out with his uru-blade. Crippled and shaken, he was still the greatest duelist the Imperium possessed.
Before any questions could be asked, other monks rose, their motions like that of marionettes being pulled on their strings. They were dead, that was certain. No life or soul filled them, only warp-craft. Dead flesh and bone tore itself apart as the monks attacked the Imperials with flexibility and power beyond the basic human form. Astartes and Custodes parried the dancing corpses and quickly hacked them to pieces, watching as the bodies danced the dance of death, even as it tore them apart. Some alien force puppetered them to fight in ways impossible to mankind.
Just as the last monk fell to a Guardian Spear strike, the next part of the performance started. A puppet show was starting and its puppeteers had finished warming up. Iridescent light ignited within the Temple statues. The hidden guardians alcoves came to life and showed their nature. These were Aeldari Soul-Dolls, Wraithbone constructs animated by the scraps of souls.
The Laughing God once had thousands of cults in his name, each worshiping in serving in their own unique ways. Those who survived the fall tucked away in the Black Library had been reborn as the Harlequins. Yet only a fragment of Cegorach's followers are known to the galaxy at large. Only some of his chosen traveled with his troupes. Others plied more secret or hidden crafts. One of these performer priesthoods is the Maerion-Tur: Cegorach's Puppet Masters. They were powerful psykers who could fracture their soul and consciousness into dozens, or even hundreds of pieces, allowing for control and perfect coordination of small armies of Soul-Dolls.
Now, these elusive children of Cegorach performed for Mankind's Anathema. Dozens of Soul-Dolls, each matching an Aspect Warrior in talent attacked. Custodes threw themselves between the homunculin tools and their master. Adamantium blades clashing with Wraithbone claws. Annoyance lanced through Iskandar, they did not have time for such things. His father suffered to protect him. These filthy Xenos would pay, but for now they had to get into orbit. Focusing his mind and body, Iskandar went to war.
Superhuman muscles pushing into overdrive, the Primarch leapt at the nearest Soul-Doll. His Uru-Blade got to work, its form shifting from whip, rapier, and saber as needed. The Primarch's weapon was a thing of genius. Memory alloys, Adamantium, and archeotech weaved together into a shape-changing blade. Its length, rigidity, and shape were subject to its wielder's skill, only limited by its size and wielders imagination. Even the most skilled Astartes would find such a weapon daunting in its complexity. Iskandar used it as an extension of his flesh.
Storms of razor-metal tore through the Soul-Doll. Before it's lacerations fully opened, Iskandar had moved to the next, and then the next. A trail of sonic-booms followed the Primarchs as he accelerated around the chamber, cutting through all fifty two Soul-Dolls in the time it took the shards from the first struck to hit the floor. In that moment of incredible violence, a flicker of surprise crossed Valdor's face as he realized what had happened. This is what a Primarch is capable of.
Exiting the Temple, the Imperials looked like a heavily armed funeral procession. Hundreds of warriors crossed the crystal bridge with the Emperor born upon his companion's shields. Such a resemblance crossed Iskandar's mind and was quickly thrown away, fear had no place in his heart now. Small packs of flesh-puppets crossed from the bridge. Composed of fallen priests and wraithbone puppets. they sought to attack the Imperials. Primarch and Honor Guard led the procession and tore through all in their way, racing the collapsing temple as massive sheets of crystal fell off its deteriorating bulk. Hundreds fell to the fury of the pursuing horde as they butchered through the outer temple and into the city proper.
Bursting free into the open air, they were greeted with a massive flash of light and sound. The Imperial Frigate had exploded in orbit, reduced to ash and scrap raining across the sky. The Emperor and his guards were stranded. As this knowledge was digested and before a new plan could be formulated, two events occurred. First, dozens of shimmering Aeldari craft flickered into being around the spire. Holofields faded as the gaudily painted ships flitted around like birds of prey. Iskandar could sense the alien intelligences within each, watching him with perfidious mirth. The second event was a great roar, like the ignition of some far off engine. Growing louder with each second, it soon became clear what the origin was.
The Enuncian aftershocks had echoed from the temple and across Proxima. The entire hive had died and rose again. A billion puppeteered corpses stampeded towards them, guided by the Laughing God's servants. The Show had just begun.
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