19. Defying Fate

Ritual, sacrifice, name, power.

God.

Pleading, cursing, vows, rage.

--everything.

Karyl closed his eyes; the psionic communication that had just ended gave his mind a brief but precious moment of relaxation.

He resisted the instinct surging in his chest, the shadows leaping behind him as if alive.

As a medium, the spire itself had acquired enough power, enough to "force" Karyl in a sense—it transmitted the sound of the Harkosus people dying.

Men or women, children or the elderly, soldiers or civilians.

Human, or Xenos.

They screamed and howled. They were stabbed, beheaded, their bellies brutally cut open and their internal organs ripped out, dismembered with blades, blasted into blood mist by bombs, and bombed into dust that dissipated into the air.

Then they came back.

The last vestiges of the deceased's spirit, their final wish, their voice echoed in his ears.

This was a radio broadcast that never ended, that could never be turned off, and he was the only listener. Despite this, Karyl showed no pity whatsoever. If anyone could look through the skull mask into his true eyes at this moment, they would find that only a sliver of final peace remained within them.

There is no longer any need to pity them.

The fate of the people of Harkosus was sealed centuries ago. They were playthings, pawns, and sacrifices, blind men bound to the altar, utterly ignorant.

Mercy cannot change their circumstances, nor can it spare them what is to come. Colluding with the Xenos within the Imperium is an almost unforgivable sin, and Karyl will not try to use his mercy to make the Eighth Legion bypass the law.

The survivors of the war will be Judgment, and one in ten "pure" will become slave laborers or servants, to atone for their sins through a lifetime of toil. They will die in misery, as will their children.

But

But.

Karyl opened his eyes, flames raging. He showed no pity, no remorse, and offered no response.

He only hates.

Fate itself is a detestable word, but it is also a real one. And for the people of Harkosus, the hand of fate that manipulates them, turning them into puppets without their knowledge, is also real.

He.

"Do you find this amusing?" he asked, then turned his gaze to the billowing, heavy the Veil, staring at it and hearing a barely audible chuckle.

"If you mean the massacre that is about to happen to all the people of Harkosus, then yes, my friend."

The thing behind the Veil smiled and answered him.

"I find it very interesting."

"A lowly false god," Karyl sneered.

"You may curse me in any language you know, my friend, and I will gladly accept it."

He leisurely pressed his face close to the Veil, and Karyl saw a constantly pulsating, misty fog, shimmering with silver light. It kept changing, in the blink of an eye manifesting thousands of different forms; it was living, it was dead, it was wind and rain, it was an old man, and it was a baby about to be born.

The Tzeentch.

Karyl gazed at the change He displayed, then slowly shook his head. "If you didn't care, you wouldn't have appeared."

"I just wanted to observe your reaction right now, my friend. You're one of the rare exceptions among us."

He replied with a hint of a smile, "Even my most courageous old friend probably wouldn't dare to, like you, confine himself to an inferior body and endure the filth of the mortal world, wallowing in depravity and suffering."

"Filthy?"

Karyl smiled slowly, and a dark flame of rage began to burn along the edge of the Veil. It throbbed, searching for traces, and tried to bring the instigator back behind the Veil, but it couldn't do anything because of his appearance and the covenant.

"Since it's so corrupt, why do you keep trying to get involved? You act like you don't care about this world at all, but you actually care terribly."

Because it's interesting.

He answered, and then his form changed again, becoming a gaunt man in a black robe, his skin repulsive as if formed of wrinkles. At that moment, He was smiling.

"I truly don't care about any of this. I have my own plans for everything. No matter how this matter is twisted in the process, or whether the changes are within my expectations, it will simply be a tiny, insignificant annotation in this blueprint that I have personally completed, nothing more."

"If you think I'll be disappointed by its failure, you're probably going to experience that emotion, which is completely foreign to me, before I do. This disaster that befell the Harkosus I means nothing to me, my friend. What do the deaths of these fools matter?"

In this cold, boundless, and cruel galaxy, is there really anyone who cares about all that they are going through?

He laughed behind the Veil —an uncontrollable laugh, a laugh cruel to the extreme. It was cruel because it was utterly real.

He truly didn't care about the defeat, the deaths of the Harkosus, or anything else. He didn't care because He only needed to succeed once.

Once is enough.

Karyl exhaled icy air from between his lips and teeth. His eyes widened, and he suddenly trembled with excitement. The gaunt man danced and shouted loudly in the darkness.

"Yes, yes, I know what you'll say, you'll say you care. I know you'll care. But do you really think you're even human? Look at yourself, my friend."

His voice lowered, becoming pure narration. His form changed again, becoming an old man with white hair, wearing a charred black suit, his eyes like coiled venomous snakes, his mouth toothless, holding a book as if telling a story.

He spoke slowly.

"You ignored the pleas for Vengeance from your own kind, allowing them to be slaughtered by a subspecies of humans. You sent your son to the battlefield, letting him step into this enormous millstone of flesh and blood. Now, you stand within this shoddy temple I hastily cobbled together for you, without shedding a single tear for the people of Harkosus."

"Do you understand, Karyl Lohars? Do you understand what I'm trying to say? You must learn from your predecessors. The Fire Thief, though a despicable thief, has endured the torment of this contradiction for countless years."

The old man smiled slightly, and his skin, weathered by wind and sun, began to peel away. The venomous snake hissed in alarm, flicking its scarlet tongue, and was torn into tattered pieces in the suddenly rising vortex. Spin, spin, spin—eternally continuing, like a mesmerizing mirror.

"He's on the verge of true madness, my friend," the mirror whispered. "And you? I'm curious, how long will it take to turn you into this?"

"You may try," Karyl replied calmly, the rustling sound echoing beneath his cloak, but the cursed second did not occur—it was refused.

"Ten thousand years? Twenty thousand years? I'm sure it would take you a very long time before you truly went insane. But..."

The mirror now reflected a deathly pale face.

His completely black eyes rested quietly above his high cheekbones; his nose was high and straight; his lips were thin and pressed into a curved line. Konrad Curze Curze smiled calmly at the person outside the mirror, like a perfect, pale sculpture.

The mirror reflected a beautiful Radiance, making half of his face Radiance and the other half shrouded in darkness. The Radiance half was quiet and trustworthy, while the dark half was covered in blood and looked insane.

"And him?"

The next second, the mirror shattered.

Where is he? Where is he? Where is he?

Countless whispers rose from the darkness, like murmurs in a dream, or the narration of a rational voice. However, in either case, they all contained a deep-seated malice.

"He's an anchor of your humanity, my friend," Tzeentch said. "And I really like that."

Karyl laughed, his muscles working monotonously, lifting his skin and twitching the corners of his mouth, making him look like a puppet glued together with hatred.

"I pity you," he said softly. "Do you know why, Tzeentch? Because those who truly have confidence in themselves never go on and on. They don't suffer like you, this pathetic creature, unable to face the reality of defeat, barking incessantly at the victors."

"But have you really won?" The voice of reason within the vortex wasn't angry, but merely inquired with curiosity. "Do you really think you've won? Harkosus has three planets, my friend. Three. Don't forget that."

He chuckled softly as he left.

Update complete.

Updates are slow because I want to maintain a certain word count while keeping the quality up to par. Sorry.