"For--! For falling to my golden lance, heretic!" Katan spat. Zara simply watched him, probing at his Body with her Skills.
"I did not fall, redcloak," she said.
"More...lies."
"Believe what you must," Zara said with finality. She was done here. "You have chosen to do so all your life. Be satisfied with your just reward."
"Fight me!" Katan raged, his free hand clawing at the stone that held him captive.
Zara wanted to; blind gods, she wanted nothing else. But she knew she didn't have to, not anymore.
"No." She said, and walked away.
"Lance of the Fall!"
Zara snapped her fingers, twice.
A brilliant crescendo sounded, a bright, joyous series of chords that made the air itself hum. Simultaneously, aquamarine light flooded from the ground below the Master Inquisitor, instantly inundating him in a sphere of pure water. Zara half turned back toward the man who now half-floated, completely submerged in the thickening liquid. His eyes were wide and veins stood out like cables in his neck.
"You have made your choice," she said, and snapped her fingers a third, and final time.
The water collapsed in on itself with enough power to restrain a corrupted Domain Core rife with the power of an entire pocket dimension. Upon Khorun Katan, it crushed his flesh and bones to jelly. With a wet, gurgling noise, the orb became nothing more than a small marble of power before fading away entirely. Only echoes were left behind.
"All choices have consequences."
Deep beneath the bones of an ancient mountain range, silence reigned.
"Report!"
The Archon's voice was a hammer blow to the assembled Arcids. There were twelve, each of them made of slightly different metals, experiments all. The smallest was no bigger than a human, while the largest stood well over twenty feet tall. But not one would meet their master's eye-fires as the Archon strode into the chamber.
"Well? Is there none brave enough? Fine," the Archon stomped a heavy metal foot, and a wash of yellow-red light surged along the squared floor tiles beneath them. A wave of misplaced stone hurled one of them forward, sending it crashing to the ground. "Number 55118, report. Now."
The Archid, its umber colored limbs twitching, stood. In a stilted voice, it began to speak.
"Ahm...All of the Reforged have been thoroughly changed, Master. Not a trace of their Type remains, though a measure of their inherent power--"
The backhand surprised everyone. Metal squealed and crumbled as the Arcid was thrown nearly forty feet and into the far wall. The Archon stomped over to his throne of green and silver stone and sat heavily.
"Number 54773. Report."
"Haarwatch has not fallen," Number 54773's calm voice declared. It stepped out of the crowd with a cool, mechanical precision before stopping only six span from the Archon's feet. It did not glance at its fellow, who was shakily extracting itself from the wall. "I just finished verifying with the advance scouts, and they claim the Wall still stands, and the interior is still relatively secure."
"Still? What of my Mark? Is it still active upon any beast within the Walls?" The Archon drummed his thick, metal fingers against the stone arm of his throne.
"Your Mark rules the Wretches yet, but they are deep within the woods, replenishing their numbers. Within the city, there is no trace of your Mark."
"How?"
"We...aren't sure, Master," Number 54773 adjusted its stance slightly. Nervously, perhaps. "All connection was lost when our link was cut. None of us retain enough Affinity to see beyond it. The Domain shattered, that much we know, so the city is dealing with a number of monstrous outbreaks. But the Domain Core...it is gone."
"Gone," the Archon let out a vibrating sigh through its golden breastplate. "How did the...what was it called?"
"A Ravager King, sir. An impressive creation by the Envoy and yourself," the Archid flattered.
The golden giant simply grunted, and the sound rattled through its chest and neck. "I merely facilitated the power and the plan. My Envoy did the true work. I am but its creator."
"Of course, sir," Number 54773 said. "But as our creator, our Father, you are the reason we can accomplish anything. All credit, all glory begins and ends with you."
Had the Archon a mouth it would have smiled. This one is quite good with words. I should invest more in their Minds from now on."How did the Ravager King die?" it asked.
"It seems there was a Master Tier Human in the city. With a Manaship."
"What," the word was an avalanche of sound, for all that the Archon did not move. "How was this not known?"
This time, the Archid trembled in clear fear. "Th-the ship was hidden. Perhaps in the Eyrie, which had previously proven scry proof. We-we aren't sure. But we do know that the Manaship's cannon fire hurt the Primordial badly. Then the Master Tier hit it with a light based Mana Skill, severing its neck."
"And that killed it?" the Archon leaned forward and felt its stone chair grind beneath it's bulk. "Just that, for a Primordial?"
"Ah, no, sir. It seems there was another figure involved," and here it paused. It glanced back at the other Arcids, but after receiving no help from them, turned back. "There is record of a man."
"..."
"He...this man somehow climbed atop the Primordial and," the Arcid paused and blinked its pale eye-fires at the Archon. "The man somehow tore it apart."
"Another Master Tier?"
"If not higher. A Grandmaster, perhaps."
The Archon shook its head. That was impossible. If such a being unveiled themselves to strike down the Primordial, he would have known, even buried in the Foglands. No, something else had happened in that contemptible city. Something strange. He did not like mysteries.
"If the Primordial died, then why do I still feel the creature's power? Why does it still weigh upon the world?"
It was weak, perhaps the weakest Primordial he'd ever sensed, but there was no mistaking it. Even from within the Foglands, the Archon could feel the pull it had, something he'd grown used to from the vile Maw with whom he'd once shared a border.
"No Primordials were left alive, sir," 54773 replied hesitantly, unsure. "Perhaps further investigation is needed."
"Yes," the Archon snarled as he sat back on his throne. He regarded the Archids before him, their specially crafted Bodies and plundered Spirits. They were nearly ready. "Find this man, and bring down that Wall, in whichever order you choose. We have little time before the Blood Moon comes. You know what is needed; what is at stake."
With a wave of the Archon's hand, the far wall rotated out of sight. The throne room became a balcony overlooking an absolutely massive staging ground, one cut through by viciously hot flows of brilliant lava. Among the flows stood hundreds of massive, metallic creatures, each of them a vivid blue-grey. They appeared sculpted from ice, rather than metal, freezing cold despite the overwhelming heat.
"We have much to do."