The Master: "Why are you trying to break free...? I said I'd help, so let me *help*. You will need all the energy you can save for what's coming, so do try to spare it."
With a flick of her wrist, precise and economical, the grotesque sphere of churning flesh and void-laced gore hovering before them divided. Like a diseased cell undergoing mitosis, it split into two identical, pulsating orbs, each now drifting ominously towards its designated recipient.
The Master: "Moreover, this is my domain... and you two are terribly weakened. Even if you wanted to escape, you would not manage."
Her tone was not boastful, merely stating a chilling fact. She was sure of it.
The Master: "Without further ado... let's begin."
Each of her hands now controlled a sphere, the air around them thrumming with contained, volatile power. As she extended her arms slowly, her gaze intent, the spheres advanced, drawn towards the frozen revenants. The shimmering purple containment field around each orb began to shred, wisps of violet energy dissipating like smoke. The sole protective barrier between their undead bodies and the gurgling mass of corrupted flesh and iridescent tar was vanishing. As it did, the magnetic pull they'd felt before returned, magnified, insatiable. The sloshy mixture lunged, gripping onto their torsos with a sickening wetness, spreading like a ravenous mould, filling each gap, each wound, each shattered plate of where armour once lay, as if swallowing them whole.
Xayn: "ARRGHHH...!"
A choked sound, more animal than articulate, was ripped from him. They could feel every particle of the invading substance. Every slow, inexorable advance of the horrifying slurry seared what was left of their cold flesh, seeped into the marrow of what remained of their bones. Their vessels, already eroded by time, undeath, and countless battles, now faced a defilement more profound than any they had endured before. The raw, physical agony was swiftly followed by a deeper, more insidious invasion. The corrupting mass didn't stop at their bodies. It crept upwards, relentlessly, until the viscous tide enveloped their entire being, oozing into their very heads.
A voice, impossibly soothing, almost motherly, began to echo within the hollows of their minds. At first, it was a chaotic symphony of formless words, meaningless phrases reverberating through their skulls like the distorted bells of a sunken cathedral. Soon, however, the cacophony coalesced. They began to understand.
The Void: "So... You two made it safely to the other side after all."
Despite its hauntingly gentle tone, the voice resonated with a chilling familiarity. Though neither Xayn nor Bazren could place it, a primal part of them knew they had heard it before, in the deepest echoes of their former existence, or perhaps in the nightmares that clung to the edges of undeath.
The Void: "Mortmundus may have crumbled, but its ashes and dust carried far... Something always remains. Something always *seeps*."
Flickering, disjointed images, sharp as obsidian shards, flashed through their consciousness: the rending tear of the portal, a screaming gateway ripped into the fabric of the living world; the faces of friends and foes, countless souls left behind in the dying realm of Mortmundus, their expressions frozen in despair or defiance; the crushing weight of sacrifices made, choices etched in blood and sorrow.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
The Void: "Xayn and Bazren... Thank you."
From the swirling abyss that now constituted their inner vision, the blackest of eyes stared back at them. They were ancient, depthless, and radiated an insatiable hunger. These eyes, this presence, wanted everything.
The Void: "With my prison shattered, I am once again free..."
The voice didn't just share words; it shared sensation. It poured its bottomless appetite into them, a chilling ecstasy of consumption... and with it, the means to sate that unending hunger.
The Void: "It is only fair that you are reborn, as I am."
The desire to kill, to consume, to assimilate all existence into their own being -- it bloomed within them, fierce and urgent, feeling as natural and essential as breathing once had. The very substance that had sought to destroy their vessels, the void-taint that had been a searing poison, now felt like a warm, silken embrace, a blanket of profound tranquillity that enwrapped and sheltered them from all pain, all fear.
Then, a silent, catastrophic explosion of pure darkness.
The Master's room convulsed. Books launched from their shelves like panicked birds, whirlwinds of parchment pages slapped against the floor, ceiling, and stone walls. The ancient, leaded windows didn't just shatter; they disintegrated, exploding outwards into the grey sky. The very stones of the tower groaned, deep cracks spiderwebbing across their ancient surfaces.
When Xayn and Bazren's senses reformed from the tumultuous chaos, they found they could perceive the Master.
And she was afraid.
Her fiery red hair was wild, her dark eyes wide with a primal terror that stripped away all her earlier composure. She looked at them as if abominations of inconceivable horror, nightmares given flesh, had materialized before her.
The Master: "Y-you...! What are you?!"
Xayn and Bazren were... formless. Their shapes, though vaguely humanoid, were now draped in a slick, oily coat of something that was not quite liquid, not quite shadow. It swirled and flowed around their limbs, constantly shifting, defying definition, absorbing the dim light of the study and giving none back. Edges blurred and reformed, hinting at geometries that made the mind ache.
It was horrifyingly clear that whatever ritual she had conceived, whatever creative solution she had boasted of, was not going according to plan. Or perhaps, it had succeeded in a way she had never dared to imagine.
The Master: "Stay away... STAY AWAY!!!"
A shimmering barrier of violet energy flared into existence around her, pulsing with desperate power. Her hands, trembling visibly, wove through frantic gestures, hurling spells of elemental fury. Gouts of fire roared towards them, seeking to incinerate. Torrents of water crashed, aiming to drown. Shards of stone erupted, attempting to contain. Howling gales of wind buffeted them, trying to blow them away.
Yet, no fire could find purchase on their shifting surfaces, fizzling into nothingness. No water could impede their advance, parting around them like a stream around ancient stones. No earth could bind them, their forms flowing through the rock as if it were mist. No wind could sway their relentless approach.
They walked towards the Master, fluid and unstoppable, two encroaching shadows in her crumbling sanctuary.
Down below, in the cramped confines of her small room, the violent shaking of the tower startled a broken-hearted Mola from her despair. Dust sifted from the ceiling, the stone floor trembling beneath her feet.
Mola: "W-what the hell is going on...?!"
She scrambled to her feet, torn. Every instinct screamed at her to flee, to leave the tower, her vengeful Master, and this whole disastrous episode behind. To save herself.
Yet... a different current pulled at her. A terrible curiosity. A sense of unfinished business. Or perhaps, the faintest, most treacherous flicker of responsibility.
She fought herself, split between the desperate urge to escape and the inexplicable compulsion to run up those trembling stairs.
She knew, with a sickening certainty, that whatever she chose, it would be a decision she could never unmake.