Page 76 of Scorching the Alien Empire
My homeworld, my cursed cradle. A titan adrift in the void, bathed in the violent glow of a flaring purple sun. A bloated moon hangs above, its dull indigo reflection cast upon the world’s turbulent surface.
The heat of it burns. The acrid, sulfuric stench chokes.
I loathe it.
The thought comes sudden and brutal. I could tear it apart. Should tear it apart. It is disgusting—vile. Teeming and writhing with too much life. Dangerous life.
But there is caution too. A creeping unease, like a phantom finger trailing down a spine that no longer exists.Theywatch. Always watching.Theywho interfere.Theythat should not be.
Aberrations.
No.
These are not my thoughts. They belong to another—to the Scythians. I feel them burrowing deep in my skull, wyrms feasting on my brain, seeking to change me, break me. But I reject them. I seeKlendathorfor what it is—the sacred cradle of the universe’s finest warriors. Uncorrupted. Pure. Apeople driven by purpose.True purpose.Pride swells in my consciousness.
Then my pride turns rancid.
A savage explosion of pain detonates inside me. Thousands of icy hooks sink into my flesh, rending and tearing with the cold, ruthless efficiency of machines. They rip me asunder. Shred me into nothing. I am cast adrift in a vast ocean of emptiness, left to languish, my thoughts fragmenting and splintering into a million jagged shards.
I drift—a torn, broken thing—lost and alone for eternity. The emptiness is absolute.
“Silence.”
The voice makes itself known—a whisper like a caress over the remnants of my mind.
Suddenly, I am aware of just how quiet it is. No breath. No heartbeat. Not even the distant rush of blood in my ears.Only the void.
“No pain.”
The concept brushes the edges of my shattered consciousness.
And it is true. There is no pain here. No lungs to breathe. No scars to ache. No body to feed.
“Oblivion.”
The word drifts into my mind, sweet and soft, like the promise of the deepest sleep.
The burdens I have carried, the weight of expectation, the chains of duty—they melt away. No longer important. No longer relevant. Just foolish concerns from a forgotten age, in a place that knows no time.
“Solitude.”
No more battles to win. No dominance to assert. No one to challenge me. No one to scheme, to manipulate. Here, in this place without meaning, none of it matters.
I feel myself dissolving, becoming nothing, as if I never was.
It is strange. Alien. A stillness I have never known.Never imagined.
I welcome it.
“Peace.”
The voice coos, fading into the distance.
Peace.
The word stings, sharp and bitter. Itoffends.
Peace?Why would I desire peace?Why would anyone? The thought is grotesque. Revolting. How can life exist without struggle? How can the Gods test our mettle if we are not tempered in the fires of war?
