|
Post by 0 on Jun 3, 2017 3:20:09 GMT
Dark indigo clouds rolled over a crimson sky, its vast expanse pierced by a thousand black pinpricks of cold, dead stars. Against it stood the pulsating silhouette of what appeared to be a massive wall of raw, infected and rotting flesh, which stretched not only from horizon to horizon, but from the highest zenith the lowest nadir, black bedrock and hellish heavens alike.
On the surface around it lay the decaying corpses of hundreds of demons, monsters, and other such unsavory creatures, which were slowly being picked apart by a massive, if scattered, throng of roaming beasts, all of shadow and stench alike; these are but a few of the invaders which had remained, now set on patrolling the wall's outskirts as mindless and vile guards, zealously protecting their territory from any who would dare to set a single toe forwards. A vast tract of the subterranean city lay as abandoned ruins for miles around it, populated only by the most hardy of demons or stubborn of imps.
Included among the decrepit was an ancient and enormous structure: the castle which for eons had stood as the ground for those whom had proven themselves fit, through might utmost, to rule over the rest of the old city's denizens.
Now it stood, as much in ruins as the rest of the area around it, partially enveloped with the "wall" which stood as the front lines for the foreign army. Behind it, within it, a dark "city", darker even than the plane which it now partially inhabited, deep as the bowels of many a rotting carcass --and just as smelly. It was without even the slightest hint of light or warmth, its citizens undying monstrosities far worse than those which now shambled across the stony city. And all of it a part of the same singularity.
A superorganism of unprecedented scale. Having long since devoured its own heatless universe, the discovery of another -- this one -- is what had led it here.
Necropolis was lucky.
In an instant, the planar city could have been wiped from the face of its own universe. Save for the life which inhabited it, it was very much akin to his home universe. And, despite the varying strength of said natives, this fact alone made the land easy pickings.
Never before had his onslaught been paused, because there had never been a need to.
Although such life that was not his own was new, it did not interest him; in fact, he hadn't even recognized any of the tiny organisms as such for the longest time, much less even considered the possibility of one of them possessing any sort of intelligence, no matter how meager. The streets of this city may have been as familiar as the open veins of his own, but the city itself did not speak to him. The voices of its drones fell on deaf ears, as meaningless and worthless as the screams of a beetle's cells to human language.
No, it wasn't any search for knowledge which had driven him to stop. The drive to conquer, to make all that wasn't his a part of him and him alone, was a far stronger desire to him than any other.
What had brought his army to halt was, of course, the planes and planets beyond this one. Specifically, that big blue ball which wheeled about a blazing, burning star. For what else dissipated darkness and strung the shadows long? What cast away the cold, but the bright heat of energy anew?
Though the night he could walk, the day would wipe him away, almost as though he had never been there in the first place.
The organisms herein may yet hold a secret to his success.
Ten days had passed since the wall's advancements had stilled. In that time, many a upstart demon had come trying to prove his worth, only to immediately be struck down. Past the territory held so firmly by the invaders, the rest of the city had soon enough returned to normal. As far as the inhabitants were concerned, the wall was just another feature of the landscape now; nothing more, nothing less.
From the depths of the wall, spies were sent out, observing the smaller life which dotted the cityscape. Listening, learning.
Patience for him was not such an easy virtue. Strategy an unnecessary distraction.
What need had he ever had of them, when with such ease he could always consume anything that lay in his wake.
Once he had learned just enough that he was certain he could communicate to some degree with them, know to some length how they thought, how they worked beyond their physical capacities, whispers began to be sent among the denizens' ranks. Like hisses in the back of one's mind, flickers in the corners of their eyes; with an itching in their limbs, sparks through their neurons scattered deep impulses and faint thoughts in some of their minds.
Desire for blood or glory. Flashes of the broken castle.
Some would ignore it, shrug it off; perhaps out of fear, or lack of want. But not all. The fierce, the greedy, the powerful, the sly...they would come to him.
Now the warlord sat, waiting for the seeds of opportunity to sprout.
|
|
|
Post by Jay on Jun 3, 2017 11:43:43 GMT
Magogirl The appearance of an exorbitant power would usually rouse just about any lesser being into action. It was a scary prospect, being faced with an entity of untold scale, and it was almost universal throughout the multiverse that you lay prostrate to a higher power such as that.
Well, in the physical universe, anyways.
Magog was no lesser. Cosmically bound, yes, thanks to that insufferable sun god, but nothing of his power had lessened. No, in fact, it only grew following the numerous dimensions he had a hand in.
The occupants of Necropolis' "throne" changed hands faster than light, and that was the reality of the plane. However, instead of some upstart ant with a fancy golden aura, it was a being of at least similarly comparable power to him. Similarly being the operant word - he felt no sense of fear.
Curiosity? Yes.
Here in the Necropolisian demiplanes, Magog found himself able to move and interact without risking the destruction of an entire galaxy through a spark. Instead of appearing in his true, amorphous form, he opted to take on another appearance altogether - perhaps the most mundane, out of place form for a being like them to ever undertake in a place like this.
A dainty human girl would walk up next to the being sat upon its throne, and looked out into the distance of the dark city.
"It's so much bigger when you're small," Magogirl stated. "I've got to hand it to these mortals - they sure have an interesting perspective." Corruptor neutral evil | timeless | sexless
|
|
|
Post by 0 on Jun 3, 2017 21:57:43 GMT
The throne room stood, dark and empty, its derelict walls filled with bubbling pustules, the corners and floors laced with fleshy, stick threads like spider webs. Though the previous ruler of Necropolis was nowhere to be found, the half-eaten corpses of her guards could be seen; thrown up against the walls, their broken bodies partially encased by the morbid interior.
Only two openings had been left, well, open, the rest enshrouded by the foreigner's flesh; there was the door to a long, lonely hallway, darker even than the room itself, and a window that allowed a view over the rest of the castle, and, of course, the city itself, through which a sliver of weak light could spill in from the realm's dying sun.
The throne itself, which could hardly be called intact, so consumed as it was by the invasive cells, held the scrawny, skinless body of what no one, much less power-hungry demons, in their right mind would call impressive. It almost appeared to be the malformed embryo of a nondescript amphibian, a threadbare form with flayed flesh and two short, stick-thin arms, both tipped with an oddly large hand of five bony fingers. It was bound to the wall itself by a thick, meaty, rope-like cord, attached to the bottom where legs might have otherwise been. For a head, it held something of a long, curving, narrow and conical shape, blade-like with a hooked end, sharp edges, and a bony texture, with no distinct features of note, not even eyes or a mouth.
Regardless of this seemingly helpless and senseless state, the creature in the chair reacted immediately to the presence of another. Almost from nowhere the dainty figure seemed to have stepped, looking as out-of-place as the creature seemed weak. But he was not fooled by the other's smaller form; as deeply embedded as he was now into this city, it was not hard to tell that this stranger did not seem to belong here, radiating an all-too-familiar presence; all of it coming together in about the same way as he. Was it another just like him?
Her approach brought a subtle hiss from the scraggly creature's body, as though it were threatened by the girl's presence. The words she spoke only further confirmed his suspicions. If it were true, and this stranger really was just one piece of a super-organism as massive as he, he would have to think of a way to get rid of it, no matter whether or not its goals aligned with his own.
He had no intentions of sharing.
The creature's body convulsed as its trailing head rose and swung about, seeming to search around for the other's face as she neared. The hissing slowly formed itself into a warbling, sinister voice, returning her observation with only two simple words of its own: "Ffatal flaawww...." From the flesh around it, two long, thick tendrils fell from the ceiling, loudly slapping down with a wet noise to either side of the throne -- and the stranger.
|
|
|
Post by Abeo on Jun 4, 2017 21:33:02 GMT
The whispering in the back of her mind did not flow from the souls of those she had consumed, hidden deep within her being. The pictures of the broken castle of Necropolis was something that nobody had ever witnessed, especially not the unfortunate ones who had ended up as her prey. The imp-like Daemon scowled as she felt the foreign hisses of something new, laced with a battle hunger that she had never experienced before. Blood… glory… easy for her to pretend she wanted, but far from the truth when it came to her goals. Nevertheless, what was stirred was not bloodlust or a thirst for power, but something new, and not too uncommon-- curiosity. The atmosphere of her current home was changing, and as something inside tried to give her an itch for something new, the feeling was redirected and stirred another. One bare foot after another, the small girl would begin to journey to the castle, now disintegrated and broken. Her curiosity drove her forward, and steered her through the deteriorating air and buildings of the city of the demons. By the time she reached the broken castle, a dainty, fair-skinned hand reached up to cover her mouth and nose. The stench of rotting flesh was almost unbearable, even for the Daemon who usually found mass amounts of blood a warm invitation. Slowly, she would venture into the broken castle, finding it just as broken and rotted as the visions she had seen before. Oriana’s guards had been killed, left as half eaten corpses, to further fill the air with the pungent scent of blood and death. Eventually, the Daemon found her way to the throne room. Why would that golden woman allow her castle and throne to be taken over by the fleshy substance. Whatever it was, it was not the most welcoming site, and almost brought the young spirit to the point of gagging, as she found herself disgusted with the being now sitting on the throne. Two tendrils fell from the ceiling, next to the barely-intact throne, and the odd small girl standing next to it. “The queen has gone… and who is left to take her place? An overgrown fetus. How lovely,” Abeo cooed, deciding that there was no point in holding her silence. She was confident at least in her abilities to escape, if she needed to.
|
|
|
Post by Jay on Jun 4, 2017 21:46:42 GMT
Magogirl The tendril coming at Magog would have caught anything else entirely off guard. The new seat of the throne was most definitely fast enough to undo most things with even a simple attack such as that.
That being said, Magog was no idiot, nor were they technically even in that spot. The funny thing about space and time is that they're all relative. At the moment they were attacked, they had already appeared in front of the new ruler. "Well, that's not very nice. Not unexpected, but still not nice."
And, somehow, another one of them was standing next to Abeo at that very second. "I never got to see the Queen. What was she like?" Corruptor neutral evil | timeless | sexless 0 Abeo
|
|
|
Post by 0 on Jun 4, 2017 23:36:53 GMT
He sensed another pass over the lines into his shadow's territory, treading its way through the castle. Eyes on the walls formed in this new stranger's passing, blinked, and then boiled away back into nothing as she continued on. This one he could tell was of a comparatively simpler sort; a single-minded beast, the sort he had come to expect from this realm. The demon's form itself left much to be desired; was everything that dared to appear before him going to look so WEAK?
The embryonic creature twitched on its throne as the girl flickered closer, no further response given to her own. The statement it gave was a stupid one, and he could only hope it wouldn't stick around to further annoy him...it was clearly capable of easily dodging his blows, not that it mattered if he'd struck anyways--he was certain of it being, at least in some notable ways, infuriatingly similar to himself, and this suspicion was once again furthered as a dual of the girl appeared, standing beside the new arrival upon her entrance into the room.
Then the demon spoke. He did not hear the girl's question after that. Although he did not understand the demon's sentence in its entirety, the insult by tone alone was not wholly lost on him.
In the seat, the creature gave a hefty convulsion, and in an instant several fleshy masses fell from the ceiling in the room, while more of his body swiftly moved to fill up the hallway behind the demon, while, like ivnes, more slipped in through the window, and the air darkened ever more as it was sewn nearly all the way shut. With any chance of escape cut off, the threads from the hall would shoot out for both the demon and the girl beside her, with the aim to wrap around their bodies and squeeze tight, possibly bruising some organs and crushing a few bones should they possess any; what would be forced to flash through their minds would include images of their bodies, twisted beyond recognition through unhumanly methods of torture, yet their brains remaining alert and breaths undying in the process, and the demon city falling under the heel of his wall.
The room's stone turned crimson as raw flesh washed over it, while the pustules in the far wall burst, pouring out black bile that swept swiftly through the floor, bringing forth a fresh breeze of the sickening stench. Like a candle's weak flame laid bare to the wind, what little warmth had been was swiftly wiped out, leaving frost to crawl through the room just as the rest of him now was.
At the same time, a third tendril unlatched from the ceiling; dropping, it crushed the remainder of the throne, wrapping up the embryonic creature in a cocoon. The bulging mass which now held it then reformed, sinuous threads twisting and winding themselves into what was essentially a much bigger, slightly more developed form of the fleshy fetus: longer, though still bony arms, now tipped with scythe-like blades instead of small hands, and a pair of grasshopper-shaped legs that now held its starving body aloft at height, each with a single viciously hooked toe, one of which stamped down directly overhead the girl that had been nearest to the throne, assuming she hadn't already moved elsewhere.
The creature's back arched strongly as it towered over the others before it, shoulders pushing into the high, softened ceiling. Bladed skull and arms alike first tapped against stone, then pierced into the flesh that had grown around it, leaving bleeding wounds that soon festered, then froze in the lowering temperatures, the creature closing in on the pair.
|
|
|
Post by Abeo on Jul 27, 2017 3:23:47 GMT
It was always a pleasant surprise when the unwanted leader of your nation suddenly wanted a hug. This one was unexpected, but as the girl mysteriously disappeared, Abeo was caught off guard by the threads to launch at her from behind. The disgusting flesh captured the young half-Daemon, wrapping around her body and limbs and slowly crushing her small frame. In her mind were those images again, yet not ones of blood and power and glory, but of her own torturous demise. Wincing in pain and feeling a cry part from her lips from both surprise and terror, she attempted to transform her body into the blazes of shadows it could become.
In that shape, she removed herself from the grasp of the ‘overgrown fetus’, who had appeared to take on a newer, grotesque form. The horrors still lingered in her mind, but for the sake of survival, she would have to use all her mental might to block them out. “Quite the temper you have there,” Abeo muttered, reforming her ethereal body while floating slightly above the floor, utilizing magic. It was not a trick she relied on often, nor was experienced in. However, she only hoped to stay away from the black bile flooding onto the floor.
Abeo felt a chill run down her spine at the change in temperate, and narrowed her red eyes at the now-broken throne of Necropolis. “What a waste,” she sighed, clicking her tongue as she reached out her senses to look for a way out. “Fine, I’ll recognize you as strong. But do you have any sort of intelligence… or at least a name?” Yes, she had reason to be fearful in this room of sickness and death. However, she did her best to keep her words stable and calm, and not display any fear in her expression or voice. The inner shaking, though, was a different story. Just what was this monster? Where was the queen of gold?
|
|
|
Post by 0 on Jul 27, 2017 19:15:29 GMT
One, two disappeared, his sense of the outbound entity that may have been a little too much like himself disappearing. Perhaps he'd scared it off, or perhaps it had finally gathered all the information it sought. He remembered to keep an eye on his borders should it return; who knows-- it may bring its own army with it next time.
The smaller demon, however, was not so lucky, and drops of saliva fell from the encroaching ceiling, hungrily satisfied with the capture. He expected something so bold as to enter his domain to be quicker, stronger, but perhaps the creature only thought itself so.
He squeezed, listening to the crunch of bone, the whistle of lungs with the breath forced out of them, all the while the overgrown embryo itself fast drew closer, bladed arms preparing to further the attack. All at once, however, his tendrils closed on air, and for a second he thought he'd thoroughly crushed the weak thing.
But there was nothing left. What body left nothing?
The demon couldn't be gone. With the darkness growing as his walls grew thicker, the big beast towering in the throne room swung its head searchingly around. Only the dimmest of lights broke through where the wall was thinnest, which, at the moment, was the single window that had originally been left alone, though now a sheet of skin had grown to cover it up. Finally, a voice broke the darkness, and it turned towards the demon, pinpointing her location as the walls absorbed her words.
Subduing his rage at least briefly, he allowed a moment for it to speak, reminding himself that these demons surely knew more of the world than him; they could hold valuable information. But, no, all it spoke was stupidity, and this only further agitated him.
He bristled at the words, the flesh along the creature's spine prickling with spiny blades, and the beast drew itself up, sharp edges piercing the flesh above. The entire room had become encased in his flesh by that point, as well as the hallway that led into it; slowly he was further consuming the old castle, while the inside the room itself the walls were gradually closing in on the demon.
The room rumbled, a sound like low thunder. Through this he spoke, in a growling, whispering voice; it gurgled like a throat halfway submerged in fluids, and the words themselves held marked difficulties in where stress should be placed.
"My...nAMe is yOURs." His sharp skull dragged noisily across the floor, the scraping sound punctuating his voice, metallic sides that would have reflected the demon's figure were the room not so dark. Curving arms lifted, stabbed into the walls; more blood and bile flowed out from the puncture wounds, the monster forcing himself further into the ceiling, the spine of his long neck bending backwards as the chest was pushed forward, where the skin was festering as though it were filled with countless burrowing maggots. "YOur NAMe iS MINe."
The walls vibrated with a sudden crack, and once more the room vibrated, although this time it was wordless. Recognition, name...what use had he of these things? He'd never needed them before, and he cared not to give anything to these vermin who, in only a few breaths of his own, would be gone.
The monster heaved. His chest shuddered, and all at once it burst open. Ribs splayed outwards, and an acidic fluid hissed as it sprayed through the air, intending to hit the demon who, by the sound of its voice, should be have been dead-center to his aim; were he wrong, however, he was sure at least some of the drops would manage to strike the offending stranger.
Cold steam rose when it hit anything it could eat, which included his own body. Although it was enough acid to kill several humans had it hit them, almost all of the wall was too thick for it to corrode completely before it sizzled away on its own -- save for that aforementioned section with the window, where a small hole was left for the plane's dying sun to shine through, the ray slipping across the liquids bubbling over the floor.
|
|