+++ IMPERIAL RECORD 6GR2E8-9E2GR4 +++

+++ SYSTEM ETHARIC +++

+++ WORLD : ETHARIC-1 – HIVE-WORLD+++

+++ POPULATION : APPROXIMATELY 20,000,000,000 +++

+++ NOTABLE ASSETS : GENETIC LABORATORIES UNDER THE DIRECTION OF MAGOS ARESTASIS – REF. PROJECT 11456-D3A8 +++

+++ ACCESS TO THIS REPORT IS RESERVED TO THOSE WITH A MAGENTA-LEVEL CLEARANCE AND ABOVE +++

+++ THE EMPEROR PROTECTS +++

He woke up with a start, as if he hadn't been sure he would ever wake again when he had lost consciousness. Pain ran through his flesh in waves of agony, and his memories were a confused mess of images and sensations. A name emerged from that muck : Bellarius. He assumed that was his own, though he didn't remember anything else with anything approaching clarity.

A moan escaped his dry lips as he struggled to take stock of his situation. He was lying down on some hard surface, but something soft covered him – a blanket, perhaps ?

'Ah,' said a voice nearby, warm and kind. 'You are awake. Easy, my lord. Do not struggle. You have been sleeping for a long, long time.'

He turned his head, and saw an old, bearded man, clad in black robes and carrying a cup of water. His view of his surroundings also began to clear, revealing a small natural cavern, in which he would barely be able to stand up. Apart from the bed upon which he sat, there was another, smaller bedding, a bookshelf, and a table. The only source of light came from a lantern suspended on the wall, but it was bright enough to see clearly. There was only one exit out of the five or so meters large room, a tunnel on the opposite side from where he was sitting.

'Drink, my lord,' continued the old man, bringing the cup to the lips of the confused man, who just then realized how parched his throat was. He opened his mouth, and the cool, scented liquid flowed upon his tongue –

the foul concoction tasted like rot and poison and blood as it was force-fed into his near-dead body

– and down his throat, slaking his thirst. He felt his mind get clearer, and the pain in his limbs fade. He turned to sit on his bed, still feeling dizzy – and as he did so, he realised that the priest was much, much smaller than him. Yet it didn't seem to him that the priest was small – it was him that was huge, somehow. Should he stand up, he estimated that he would almost twice as tall as the man.

'Just as the prophecy said,' continued the priest, 'you have awoken.'

'The prophecy ?' croaked Bellarius. 'What are you talking about ?'

'A vision that came to one of my predecessors who watched over your sleeping form, my lord. It told him that a day would come when the lands of Etharic would need you, and you would rise from your slumber to bring back unity and piece to the shattered kingdoms. I feared that this time had come, and that you wouldn't awaken – but I see now that I was only lacking in faith.'

'How ... how long was I sleeping ? I don't remember ... anything, except my name ...'

'Your name ?' the priest appeared surprised, then an awed expression formed on his face. 'Could you ... could you tell it to me, lord ? It has been so long that it has been forgotten.'

That was ... strange. They had passed on that prophecy about him down the generations, but they had forgotten his name ? Wasn't that important as well ?

'... Bellarius. My name is Bellarius. Now answer my questions. First, tell me ... What is your name ?'

The priest smiled warmly and replied :

'My name is Karalet, my lord.'

What followed were a few very enlightening hours for Bellarius, as Karalet told him about the history of Etharic – for such was the name of the world upon which they all lived. The old man brought up ancient maps and paintings, and taught the newly-awakened noble all that he would need to know in order to fulfill his destiny.

In ages past, the gods had created Etharic, and seeded life upon the world. In time, humans had appeared, and the gods had favoured them as their children, bestowing many gifts upon them, such as singing, writing, and other talents. None of the gifts, however, had matched the sending of the Lords, envoys of the Gods charged to guide the growing human population through the trials of existence. These lords had been shaped in the forms of men and women, though all who looked upon them immediately knew their greatness and trusted in their will.

Bellarius had been one of these lords, born not from humans, but from the hands of the gods themselves. He had helped the people of Etharic achieve their full potential, ruling over one of the greatest city of this golden age. But then, from beyond the reach of even the gods themselves, a dark and terrible threat had arrived – one that would have ended all life upon the entire planet, if not for Bellarius' own heroic sacrifice in battle against it.

Bellarius had banished that evil – now only known as the Shadow – and restored peace across Etharic, but such had been the wounds he had endured in the battle that he had fallen into the coma from which he had just finally awoken. It annoyed and troubled Bellarius that the exact details of his supposed sacrifice had also been forgotten, but Karalet had assured him that the evil he had fought was so dark and horrible, no mind had been able to bear knowledge of it long enough to pass it on.

Yet in the end, despite his sacrifice, Etharic's age of glory had ended some three hundred years ago, a mere few years after Bellarius' fall. Some terrible, unknowable event had cut Etharic off the heavenly realm, and killed many of the lords and ladies of Etharic. Those of the noble lords who had survived, without the guidance of the Gods, had fallen into insanity and turned against one another. They had dragged their kingdoms along with them, and a cold war had broken out between the realms. For three centuries this war had been consigned to skirmishes and the occasional open, prolonged conflict between two lords.

Now, however, the darkness that had been massing in the heart of every lord and lady of Etharic had reached a boiling point. The seven mightiest lords had each publicly denounced the others as heretics and traitors to the Gods' will, responsible for their silence. They had all gathered their armies and marched to the place where, according to legend, the link between the Gods and Etharic would be restored. They had come to the plain below Bellarius' tomb – the field where he, the eighth of their number, had fallen in battle, three hundred years ago. The minor lords had flocked here as well, drawn into the imminent conflict by webs of alliance and oaths of fealty to their betters.

Already, what had been previously unthinkable – the death of several of the supposed immortal lords – had occurred, as tensions grew too high and armies clashed against one another, with their masters leading the way. Their people had been driven mad by their demise, and had scattered into the woods, wailing their sorrow in pitiful choirs of the lost. The seven major lords – the Sovereigns of Etharic – remained, their forces gathered around them, none willing to commit to battle against their rivals first. Still, it was inevitable that eventually one of them would move, and all the others would follow, and the plains would drown in blood once more, just as they had when Bellarius had led his forces to war in the time before his long slumber.

Karalet insisted that only Bellarius could prevent an explosion of violence that would leave Etharic leaderless, which would promptly lead to anarchy and untold ruin. Bellarius wasn't so certain – he certainly didn't feel like a saviour. His body still hurt every time he moved, despite the restorative effects of whatever concoction Karalet had fed him. But the priest showed him the ancient scrolls, depicting a silhouette rising from the monument built to honor his sacrifice, holding a sword carved from a single piece of green metal and bringing peace once more across the world. Granted, the scrolls did not tell much about how he was supposed to do that, but the mere fact that he had risen from his slumber at the appointed time indicated that there was something to the prophecy.

And the truth was, he had no choice – not really. Karalet did not say it out loud, but it was obvious when Bellarius considered the situation. The armies were already gathered, and it was only a matter of time before one of their patrols found the cavern where Karalet and his predecessors had secretly cared for Bellarius' body while the rest of the world slowly descended into madness. There was nowhere he could flee to, for the Sovereigns held the entire planet in their grasp, and he wasn't exactly hard to notice. He would be noticed, and then what ? Would he flee again ? If he did not do something to end the madness of the Sovereigns, then there was no telling what any of them would do if they captured him.

Beyond the bare necessity of action, there were also moral considerations to take into account. Karalet painted a bleak picture of the world, where entire cities had fallen into ruin as their lord descended into madness and lost interest with the day-to-day management of his territories. Bellarius' memories might be clouded, but the old priest had assured him that it would only be temporary, and he wanted to do what his old self would have done.

So, after donning a suit of armor that had been religiously preserved and taking up his ancient but still sharp longsword, Bellarius emerged from the cavern where he had slept for three hundred years., and saw the world he was destined to save. He stood near the base of a mountain, but still high enough that he had a clear view of his surroundings for kilometers. He saw green forests and vast meadows, crossed by rivers of clear water. In the distance, he could see shining cities of white marble and stone -

stinking marshes and fallen, burned trees, with mountains of shattered towers and ruined houses under a sky filled with toxic clouds through which shone baleful light

- It was beautiful, and Bellarius resolved that he would do all he could to help restore peace and order to this land. For he could also see the signs of war : columns of smoke rising above the camps where armies had gathered, patches of forest where the trees had been cut to feed the camp-fires, and flocks of raven flying over plains that he knew must be littered with corpses.

Not too far away, he could see the monument that had been built on the site of his downfall – a towering obelisk, some one hundred meters tall. According to Karalet, it was generally simply called the Monument, though other names, such as Bellarius' Grave or the Pillar of Sacrifice were also commonplace. At the foot of the structure were countless small dots – one of the armies gathered by the Lords. Only one of the Sovereigns would have the prestige to lay claim to Bellarius' presumed tomb – in time, he would need to go there and confront whoever was in charge. But before that, there was something else he had to do.

According to Karalet's last advice – to his eternal regrets, the old man was too frail to accompany him in his journey – his best choice of destination was the nearest forest, where the followers of the two dead Lords had fled. After all, if he was to bring peace and order back to the land, where better to begin than with those who had lost everything ?

By his estimation of the sun's course in the clear sky, it took Bellarius about an hour to reach the camp that the soldiers had improvised in the forest. There must have been hundreds of soldiers here. Some of them were gathered around camp-fires or under tents, while others were engaged in rites of mourning, tearing at their hair and weeping openly at the sky. The equipment of the soldiers varied greatly, from swords to axes to bows and slingshots -

scraps of old rags tightened around twisted bones and inflated muscle, scaled skin and elongated fangs

- but all of them wore a strip of cloth around one of their arm, which was either purple or blue.

As the soldiers saw Bellarius, shouts of alarms rose, quickly turning to awe as they realised the nature of the newcomer. One of them approached him hesitantly, his hand going nervously to the hilt of the sword hanging at his hip – though he did not draw it. However, as soon as Bellarius turned his eyes in his direction, the soldier froze in place, as if transfixed by the Lord's appearance.

'Tell me,' asked Bellarius, 'to which of my two fallen brethren did the occupants of this camp owe their loyalty ?'

'Both,' replied the man, looking up at Bellarius' visage. 'When our masters fell, we both came here to mourn them together, away from the other lords. I fought on Lord Dectarion's side,' continued the soldier, gesturing toward the blue stripe on his right arm, 'against Lady Merialis.'

That explained the stripes, at least. With the armies being composed of whatever subjects the Lords could gather and bring with them to war, creation of proper uniforms had probably not been a priority, and these men had improvised another way to differentiate between their comrades and their foes in the heat of battle. Yet it also rose another question :

'Your masters killed one another in battle,' noted Bellarius with incredulity, 'and yet you are here together ?'

The man shrugged. There was a haunted look in his eyes as he explained :

'We were enemies because our masters commanded it, sir. When they died, we ... Most of us just wanted to stop fighting. There was no reason to anymore. I loved my lord, make no mistake ... But I wasn't blind to what was happening to him either. He wasn't right in the head at the end. The Separation, it ... it has done terrible things to some of your kindred.'

The Separation. Karalet had told him that this was the name the common people of Etharic had given to the event that had killed most of the Lords and cut off the survivors from the voice of the Gods, eventually driving them into madness. No one knew what had caused this. The Lords had struggled to continue their duty at first, but they had not been created for such circumstances, and the burden of leading their people had taken its toll over the last three hundred years.

'No need to be gentle, soldier. I know what has happened to the other Lords.' Bellarius took a deep breath. Around him, he could sense some of the gazes pointed in his direction start to become hostile. These people had, after all, been driven from their homes and made to fight at the behest of creatures such as him – beings that had singularly failed in their divinely-appointed mandates. He needed to do something to avoid things degenerating, and quickly.

'Show me their bodies, please,' he asked. 'I would like to pay my respects to them.'

With a surprised look on his face, the soldier led Bellarius toward the center of the camp, where the mortal remains of the two nobles had been brought by their loyal servants. The two bodies had been laid down next to each other, resting on small piles of wood. In death, Lady Merialis and Lord Dectarion looked very peaceful, free of whatever madness had caused them to kill each other. Both had regal, noble features –

one of the corpses was a squid from the waist down, and the other was covered in black, manged fur from its canine-shaped head to its backward-jointed legs

– and still wore their armor, with their weapons laid across their chest by their mourning followers. Bellarius came to one knee, bowing before the dead Lords, paying his respects with a silent prayer for their peaceful return to the realm of the gods now that their time on the mortal coil was ended. The soldiers around him fell silent as they saw him – some fell to their own knees to join him, and a few even started quietly sobbing.

And just like that, the tension had been banished. A man who had seemed about to strike at him with his spear was one of those who had begun to cry, overcome by the sudden return of his sorrow at his master's demise. Bellarius turned from the bier, and gently raised up the man's chin until they were looking each other in the eyes.

'What is your name, soldier ?' he asked, as softly as he could.

'Marcus,' replied the man, his voice quiet to the point of being almost inaudible.

'Marcus. Do you know who I am ?'

The soldier looked at him in incomprehension, then his eyes fell on the sword on his waist and widened as understanding dawned behind them. Bellarius saw the disbelief form first, then the awe, and Marcus fell to his knees once more, prostrating before the giant before him. Marcus had, of course, known that Bellarius was a Lord from the moment he had entered the camp – there was no mistaking someone his size for anything else. But now he had recognized the sword, and remembered the stories he had been told as a child – stories that had doubtlessly been circulating with renewed strength around the camp-fires among the armies gathered for this grand battle.

'My lord,' muttered Marcus, looking up at Bellarius in adoration. 'You ... You have returned ? After all this time, we had begun to lost hope ...'

'Yes,' confirmed Bellarius. 'I have returned.'

Any doubt Bellarius had had on his mission were gone now. These soldiers, and countless more like them, had been driven into a battle they had no real desire to fight. The bonds of loyalty between them and their Lords that should have been rewarded with rightful, benevolent guidance had been used to force them into killing their own kind. He could not allow it to continue, no matter the risks, no matter what the cost might be. The madness of the Sovereigns and their vassals had to be put to an end.

Bellarius snatched a torch from one of them and, ceremoniously, brought it down upon the bier. The fire spread quickly, as did a sudden silence among the troops as they all turned toward him. He drew his sword and held it above his head, letting it catch the light of the bonfire. Once he was certain everyone in the camp was looking at him, he shouted, loud enough that they could all hear him :

'I am Bellarius ! I am the Destroyer of the Shadow ! For three hundred years I have slumbered as my wounds healed, but now I have returned ! As the Gods' prophecy foretold, I shall put an end to the madness of my kindred and restore order and peace across Etharic !'

'Your masters have fallen, slain not by each other, but by the madness that has come to them since the Separation ! Yet you still have a chance to make a difference, to make it so that such senseless violence never again taints Etharic's blessed soil. '

'I intend to stop this coming war, to prevent the slaughter and restore the balance to this world. Join me, and together we will make the Sovereigns bend knee and free them from the madness that has consumed them. Will you march with me ?'

The soldiers raised their own weapons and roared their approval. None of them asked Bellarius how exactly he intended to do all of these things – he had given them hope, and a purpose, and that was enough. All of their lives, they had followed the commands of their lords without question. Now that these lords were dead, they were desperate for another to lead them, whether they realised it or not. And he would give them that purpose – but, he also swore to himself, he would never use them as their previous masters had. He would ensure that if any of them died under his command, it would be for something more than the whims of a mad godling.

'My lord,' said Marcus, worship evident on his face. 'We are yours to command. What is your bidding ?'

As soon as he heard the question, a plan began to form in Bellarius' mind, as if born of divine inspiration. He turned toward the distant shape of the Monument, and pointed his sword in the direction of the obelisk.

'We will march upon the Pillar of Sacrifice,' he declared, trying to sound as imperious as possible, 'and I shall speak with my kindred there, to free him of madness' clutches and return to him the light of the Gods. This I have decreed !'

More than two thousand soldiers had fled in the woods, and they all answered Bellarius' call. Rank upon rank of warriors marched through the forest once more, this time not in shameful retreat, but their hearts filled with pride and conviction. They had torn off their colored strips of cloth, symbolically casting off their ancient allegiances in favor of following Bellarius to the victory and peace he had promised them.

As they marched, Bellarius focused his thoughts on the confrontation ahead. He had questioned Marcus on which of the Sovereigns held the Monument, and the soldier's answers worried him. And the fact that Marcus had given signs that the other Sovereigns were just as bad, if not worse, had done little to appease that worry. He was beginning to wonder if there was any chance of a peaceful resolution to Etharic's current crisis.

The Sovereign whose army waited at the foot of Bellarius' tomb, Lord Nerkor was the master of the City of Spires, now long since fallen to ruin. He had been alive three hundred years ago, and his name caused some stirs in Bellarius' shrouded memory. Perhaps the two of them had known each other – in that case, Bellarius hoped a peaceful discussion was possible. But the rumors of Nerkor's madness that Marcus had reported made that an unlikely prospect.

Before the Separation, the City of Spires had been a prosperous harbor, a nexus of commerce between the nearby cities. Through Nerkor's leadership, the merchants had prospered, and through them the entire city and its surroundings. But when the gods had gone silent, Nerkor had begun to grow more and more erratic. Tax rates had randomly shifted, public buildings had collapsed for lack of maintenance, entire families were wiped out because of imaginary sins. The people of the City of Spires had lived in fear of their own ruler for generations, but that terror was balanced by a loyalty that, even now, was still strong. The very city owned its existence to the efforts of the Sovereign, and the sheer size of the debt they owed him had prevented the people from departing it for greener pastures – not that there were any left on Etharic by that point.

The camp spread for kilometers around the Monument, surrounded by a deep trench and a wooden fence. There must have been tens of thousands of soldiers inside, and hundreds of them were watching over the ramparts. Reflecting the still considerable wealth of the City of Spires, these exemplars of Nerkor's army were clad in uniformed chain mail, and were armed with bows and long spears. Bellarius could easily imagine how costly a direct assault on these walls would be, regardless of how primitive they might appear.

The Lord of Etharic rose a hand, and commanded his forces to stop while still in the cover of the woods. Then, with only the soldiers closest to him as escort, he walked out into the open and marched slowly toward the nearest gate. As before, cries of alarm rose, but these were far more aggressive than those he had faced in the forest. Though Bellarius was careful to appear as non threatening as possible, bows were drawn and spears aimed at his chest, clutched in tightened fists. He stopped twelve meters from the gate, rose his sword high so that the sentinels could see the color of the blade, and declared :

'I am Bellarius ! I am the Shadowslayer, returned after three hundred years of slumber ! I would speak with my brother Nerkor, whose brave soldiers have secured my Monument in my absence !'

There was a moment of silence, then voices burst in alarm as his call was relayed throughout the camp. For several minutes, Bellarius and his escort stood in place, waiting. Then the gates of the camp flew open, revealing a figure that could only be Lord Nerkor himself. The Sovereign was tall, taller than Bellarius even, and clad in heavy plates of grey armor engraved with minute script that told of the countless victories and honors this mighty Lord had earned. In his hand, he held a two-handed sword, with the flat of the blade resting casually on his right shoulder as he advanced confidently toward Bellarius -

an obese giant, covered in flabs of flat and pustules, holding a giant, rusted cleaver, tied to a primitive hilt by strips of leather

- and stopped when they were only a few steps from one another. For a few seconds, the two Lords of Etharic stared at one another, unwilling to be the first to speak.

It was the first time in his memory that Bellarius met with another of his kin, and he found that the experience was unpleasant. Nerkor's aura of command was potent, even to him. The Sovereign radiated majesty and confidence in waves, his armor shining in the light of the sun. He looked every bit the rightful Lord that his followers believed him to be ... safe for the look on his face. His visage was distorted into an expression of hatred and stupor, as if he was painfully struggling to understand the world around him through a thick mist.

'Bellarius,' he said, in a voice like the sound of rocks rumbling down a mountain to bury a village in the valley below. 'Shadowslayer. You have come back.'

'Yes,' replied Bellarius, nodding slightly, his eyes still fixed in Nerkor's own, black and burning. 'I have. This madness must end, brother. This war cannot be allowed to happen.'

Nerkor laughed then, a mirthless, cruel and desperate laugh all at once.

'Do you think I don't know that, brother ? Do you think I want to be here, preparing to fight against my own kin ? None of us want that, Dead One.'

'Then why are you here at all ?' asked Bellarius. Yet even as he spoke the question aloud, he felt a sickening dread form in his stomach, as if he already knew what the answer was going to be.

'Isn't it obvious ? We are all here because of you ! The thrice-cursed prophecy of your return is the reason why we are here, Bellarius ! The priests all saw the same thing in their visions, after three hundred years for us without receiving even a single word from our masters above. They told us all that they had seen you rise from your grave and come back to kill us, to end our reign and replace us as the sole steward of that world !

'Half of the other Sovereigns are here in the hope that they can redeem themselves by joining you. The others are here to kill them before they can do this. As for me ... I have come for you, Bellarius.'

Nerkor brought his blade down onto the ground, where it buried itself several centimetres into the soft earth under its colossal weight.

'The Gods have already returned, brother,' continued the Sovereign, madness gleaming in his eyes. 'We can sense their presence in the heavens, and the visions they sent to the priests confirmed that it wasn't another sign of our splintering minds. But they have discarded us. Abandoned us ! They will only favor you, you who slept while we suffered, you who didn't have to bear the burden they weren't here to help us carry !'

'I will not be replaced !' he roared suddenly, his neck bent so that he was screaming right to the heavens. 'I will not be cast out ! Do you hear me, my lords ? I am not your instrument ! I am not a puppet ! I am a Lord of Etharic !'

With a scream of rage, Nerkor charged toward a stupefied Bellarius. He barely had time to dodge the down strike of the zweihander, then to bring his own sword up to parry the next blow. His mind reeled with what Nerkor had said, with the implications of his words.

Then there was no time for thought, as Lord and Sovereign tried their best to kill each other, while their soldiers watched on in mute horror.

It only took a few seconds for Bellarius to realize that he could not match Nerkor's physical strength. His opponent was far more heavily built than he was, and a single strike from his sword would cut Bellarius in half. Fortunately, his emerald sword was capable of resisting even the full power of one of Nerkor's blows – but his own body would not, as his painfully throbbing arms informed him after the first parry. So Bellarius fought to turn aside the strikes rather than block them fully. He moved on pure reaction, letting instincts that had been dormant for centuries rise to the fore and take control of his body.

Though the battle had begun at Nerkor's advantage, Bellarius slowly managed to turn the tide. Knowing he couldn't overpower his foe, he used his speed to dodge as often as he parried, and took advantage of the openings this created in Nerkor's guard to strike back at his foe. He only managed to inflict glancing blows, that did little more beyond scratching the metal of Nerkor's armor – and enrage him even further. His attacks became less and less precise, but even a minor hit was enough to send Bellarius reeling, blood gushing from his left arm. Snarling, Nerkor moved to finish him, rising his great sword high to strike it in a downward arc ...

... but Bellarius was quicker, and before the Sovereign could bring his weapon down, he struck right at Nerkor's throat with his own sword, leaning forward to get the reach, knowing that if he missed, he would not have time to dodge a blow that would tear him to pieces.

The emerald blade pierced through Nerkor's gorget in a shower of sparks, and ran through his throat. Dark, rich blood burst from the lethal wound in a torrent, and the Sovereign's grip over his zweihander slacked, letting the heavy weapon fall to the ground behind him as he himself collapsed to his knees, hands weakly trying to staunch the flow of blood.

'I am sorry, brother,' said Bellarius, his breathing short and ragged by exertion. But it did not seem that Nerkor had heard him, for he merely stared up at the heavens once more :

'I am not ... a puppet ...'

Nerkor's last words slurred from his mouth amidst a flow of blood, before the light faded from his eyes. As the Sovereign died, Bellarius sensed something shift in the air, and a wave of some indescribable emotion washed over him, spreading outward from the corpse in a circle. Nerkor's body relaxed and slumped to the ground, taking on the same peaceful appearance of the two dead Lords Bellarius had seen on the pyre. The only thing breaking the illusion that he was merely sleeping was the crimson fluid spread over his face. It seemed that death truly freed the Lords from the grip of madness. Was that to be how he ended the plague of insanity among his kindred, then ? Would he have to kill every single Lord on Etharic until he was the last one standing ?

And was that exactly what Nerkor had foreseen, and sought to avoid by killing him before he could fulfill the Gods' prophecy ? With the Sovereign dead, his words before they had begun to fight returned to Bellarius' mind. Had they been true, or simply the product of Nerkor's fevered mind ? And if they were true, what should he do ?

His thoughts were interrupted by the sounds of uncertain cheering coming from behind him, and weeping from in front. The shock of seeing him kill another Lord had faded, replaced by elation in those who followed him, and horror in those who had followed Nerkor.

'Surrender,' he wheezed, still out of breath. After taking a deep lungful of blood-scented air, he shouted again at the camp : 'Surrender ! I command it !'

There was a floating instant of silence and uncertainty, as the soldiers on the walls were unsure how to respond. Bellarius seized the moment, forcing his will upon them before the full realisation of their Lord's death hit them like it had the soldiers he had found in the woods. Standing straight, he walked slowly toward the open gate, trying his best to look as if he were simply entering into his own domain. The silence deepened as the soldiers of the City of Spires watched him stroll through their camp, which was much better organised and supplied than the last one he had visited -

rotten wood, bared fangs and claws, stinking meat hanging over fire pits, pale faces staring at him with feverous eyes

- with soldiers pressing on the sides of the path Bellarius was walking, but none daring to stand in his way. Behind the Lord of Etharic came a few of his soldiers, those who had been brave enough to follow him into what had been the enemy camp minutes ago – and might still be. Bellarius was pleasantly surprised to see that Marcus was among them.

Soon, they came in front of the Monument, where Nerkor had raised his personal tent, a grand thing of crimson and azure tissue that still looked insignificant compared to the obelisk. The pillar of white stone shone in the light of day, the sun's rays illuminating the scenes that had been engraved upon it. Scenes depicting the highlights of Bellarius' past life were side-by-side with columns of symbols that he couldn't read but that felt familiar -

a ruined tower of steel and rockcrete, the sole remaining structure of the city that had once stood there, covered in moss and creeping plants, whose broken windows caused the wind passing through to sing mournfully

- several persons were waiting in front of the tent. Five of them wore the armors of officers, and clung to the weapons hanging at their waist nervously. The sixth was an old crone, resting on a crooked wood staff for support and wearing a blindfold – yet her head was pointed straight in Bellarius' direction nonetheless. The robe she wore reminded Bellarius of the one Karalet had worn, though this one was grey instead of black.

'Lord Bellarius,' said the woman, bowing slowly and visibly painfully. 'I knew you would come.'

'That's the second time today I have been told my awakening was foretold,' answered Bellarius. 'Are you a priestess of the Gods ?'

'I am,' she acquiesced. 'My name is Nyrelle, lord. I served Lord Nerkor for fifty years. I told him that he could not prevent the prophecy from coming to pass, but he did not listen to me. The burdens of his role as leader of the City of the Spires had done too much damage to his mind at the end. You did him a mercy when you released him from his mortal body and sent his spirit back to the divines.'

'Did I really ?' muttered Bellarius, before turning to the officers. 'And you. Who are you ?'

The one in the middle stepped forward and took a knee, quickly imitated by the other two. Though he was slightly trembling from facing the one who had slain his lord, he still looked up at Bellarius with defiant eyes, unwilling to let his fear show on his face. When he spoke, his voice was loud and clear :

'I am Captain Lest of the City of Spires. Me and by two colleagues are here to ask that you show mercy to the forces under our command in exchange for our surrender. You ...' he took a deep breath, forcing the next words to come out : 'You defeated Lord Nerkor in honorable single combat, and I see that you are the one the prophecies spoke of. I will not stand in the way of the Gods' will, and I am ready to give you my life, but I ask that you spare my men from any punishment. They did not oppose you, and have committed no crime against the Gods.'

'Is this what all of you think ?' asked Bellarius, looking at the two captains who had remained behind.

Both of them nodded silently. He could sense their anger and their sorrow, but also the same thing he had felt in the forest camp : an underlying acceptance, a relief even. These soldiers had been loyal to Nerkor, but they had been under no illusion as to his mental state. Oaths of gratitude generations old had demanded that they fought for him, but in the end, they did not want to fight their countrymen anymore than anyone else.

'Then I accept your surrender, but I will not take your lives. Raise, and return to your troops. We ...'

His announcement was interrupted by an alarmed call from the walls, where the sentries had finally turned their eyes away from the situation at the center of the camp and back to the outside.

'They are coming ! They are coming ! The Sovereigns are coming !'

Bellarius froze for a few seconds, then rushed to the walls, the ranks of onlookers splitting before him while they themselves ran to get their weapons and armor. He climbed up the steps three at a time, Marcus right behind him. Immediately after reaching the top, he saw the other armies on the march, their banners raised high. The six remaining Sovereigns of Etharic were making their move, converging on the Monument with their vassals to take part in the final battle for the planet's fate. Judging by the banners' positions, each of the Sovereigns had gathered his court of Lords and Ladies around him, forming an unbreakable core for his or her army.

There was no more time for persuasion, no more time for duels and rallying speeches. Even though kilometers still separated the camp from the armies that marched toward it, Bellarius could feel the souls of his brethren at the heart of each host, sense the weight of their decisions. The momentum of these armies would not be stopped. Had the other Sovereigns sensed Nerkor's death in the same manner he had, and resolved to prevent the same fate from falling upon them ?

In the end, it mattered little. Every other path had just been closed forever; now only outright warfare could put an end to the insane reign of the Lords of Etharic. Bellarius looked at the armies again, trying to trace the paths each of them would take. By his estimations, all advancing forces would cross paths with at least one other group before reaching the fortified camp. It was possible that they would destroy each other, but also that they would join forces to prevent Bellarius from fulfilling the prophecy. The Lord opened his mouth, about to shout his orders that the gates be opened so that the rest of his forces in the wood could come in, and then that everyone prepares for a defensive battle ...

... but the words died on his tongue, and it was all that he could do to watch in terrified awe, as the judgement of the Gods descended upon Etharic.

It began with a pillar of fire coming down from the heavens. One moment, the entire armies of two Sovereigns had been about to make contact, their Lords leading the charge toward each others. Then, in a blaze so bright it brought tears to Bellarius' eyes, both courts disappeared, leaving naught but an enormous crater behind.

Every remaining army stopped dead in its tracks, every eye locked onto the divine retribution that had just been unleashed. But that was only the first part, for next came angels, descending from the skies on wings of pure celestial light -

with engines roaring, packs of gunships descended upon the four remaining armies

- the angels landed near to the Sovereigns, and even from afar, Bellarius could see the brightness of their blades as they brought them down upon the insane Lords of Etharic -

the sound of bolter fire echoed across the desert plains, accompanied by the screams of the dying

- blade – gun – angels – gunships – golden armor – black giants - pain

- Bellarius screamed, feeling as if his head was being torn apart from the inside. Images flashed in his brain, and the scenery around him kept changing before he had a chance to understand what was going on. Finally, as he was leaning on the wall for support, his hands pressed against his throbbing eyes, the pain receded. Behind him, he heard a concerned voice calling out. He turned toward it ...

... and recoiled in horror as he saw what Marcus had suddenly become. The soldier was gone, and in his place stood a grotesque caricature of a human being : a hunched, emaciated humanoid, with the head of a goat instead of a man's. Three-fingered claws ended long, two-articulated limbs, and yet there was no mistaking the look of worship in the creature's yellow eyes as it looked upon Bellarius.

The Lord of Etharic looked around him, and saw that every single soldier in the camp had also transformed into a monstrous creature. No two were identical, but all shared the corruption and ugliness of the first. Abominable hybrids of human and animal forms were common, but there were others, unnameable horrors on display as well : globulous eyes peering from exposed chests, skin that hung off muscle like melted wax, small holes into glowing flesh from which emanated small, greenish flames, and a carnival of other deformities.

As Bellarius saw these monsters, so too did they see him, and they reacted to his gaze with violent madness. They howled and shrieked, their twisted vocal chords somehow managing to get across the horror and despair they felt at what they had become. In the distance, the armies of the other Lords were in similar throes, and the sounds of fighting could be heard amidst the choirs of laments as entire armies suddenly turned against themselves. Around the Lord of Etharic, things that had been men moments ago started to tear at each other's flesh and their own in a self-destructive rage.

Bellarius stumbled, shaken by the nightmarish vision, and lost his precarious footing on the pile of detritus that the wooden wall had become. He slipped down the entire thing and landed inside the camp. Trembling, he stood up and shook his head, trying to shake off the horror surrounding him, but his eyes fell upon a pool of blood, and he caught a glimpse of his reflection in the spilled vitae. Where before he had looked down upon his body and seen a perfect example of the human form, if a huge one, now the image in the reflection was that of a monster.

His entire body was bulging with grotesquely inflated muscles, his arms reached down to the ground, and instead of holding a sword, as he had believed, his hands ended in a set of half a meter long claws, dripping a foul-smelling green ichor and covered in the blood and guts of those he had slain. His skin was pale and covered with old scars, some of which had reopened in the battle and were now leaking a foul-smelling pale ichor. His face was elongated, and his eyes, instead of human globe oculars, were two emerald that somehow still saw color perfectly well, while a filthy mane of white hair fell down his shoulders in a tangled mess. He wasn't wearing an ancient armor, but torn, dirty furs strapped around his waist. The only thing that had not changed was his size, for even on the ground, he still towered above the lesser monstrosities that scampered around him.

He looked up, in despair, trying to escape the horrific sights all around him. But all he saw upward was that the skies were no longer blue – instead, they were filled with roiling crimson tides, and arcs of black lightning coursed through them in patterns that burned his mind. Bellarius saw faces in these flashes as well, the monstrous avian visages of god-like creatures who looked down upon Etharic and laughed at what they beheld.

Bellarius screamed, over and over, trying vainly to expel the horror he felt. He rolled on the ground, shaking uncontrollably, until his sight fell upon a familiar priest clad in black robes. Karalet was here. Somehow, the old man had managed to come here. Relief flood Bellarius, and he crawled toward the priest, desperate for his aid. Karalet knew so much about Etharic - surely he would know what was going on, he would know how to make it better, he -

wasn't a priest at all. Instead, he was a figure in black, baroque armor, almost as tall as Bellarius himself and towering above his crawling form, holding in his hands an eight-pointed mace. Both weapon and armor were inscribed with flaring runes that burned Bellarius' eyes. The apparition's face was bare, revealing a nightmarish patchwork of skin, some of which was pale and sickly, while the rest was either horribly charred or smooth as that of a newborn.

'No,' whispered Bellarius. 'No, no, no, no ...'

'Yes,' said the giant in a cruel and amused tone. 'Yes, it is true. All that you saw before is a lie. This is your reality, my lord. And it is time you face it.'

'No,' murmured the stricken mutant. 'Stop it. Please ...'

'Your people were not created by the Gods,' continued the giant mercilessly. 'They came here from another world, thousands of years ago. And you and your kind aren't divine envoys, crafted to guide those below you by the hands of the Gods themselves. You are those who adapted best to the mutagenic plague that was unleashed upon this world when the Storm engulfed it. You were transfigured, and gained great power and longevity ... As well as the best way possible to control those who reacted to the plague by becoming this.'

The black-armoured man gestured toward the teeming hordes all around them, who had started to howl in agony at about the same time Bellarius had started to see reality once more.

'They are the descendants of this world's populous when the plague struck, Bellarius. And each of them knows, deep inside, that he or she is nothing more than a twisted abomination. Why do you think they flocked to you so eagerly after their lords died ?

Bellarius remained silent, shocked beyond words. Karalet continued :

'It wasn't because of your commanding presence, oh no, no matter what your delusion might have rationalised it as. It was because only by being near one of your kind can they be dragged into your madness, and escape the horror of their true existence – a horror so great, they willingly let you and your kind rewrite their memories to fit into your delusions. Their loyalty and devotion are the price they pay to continue the lie that make their lives bearable. And now that this illusion is gone, they are unable to cope with the truth. It has happened before – three hundred years ago, in fact. When the Lords first met, and their delusions clashed, they began to catch glimpses of the truth behind the veil of madness – and they started to kill each other until they were few enough in numbers that their dreams could align with one another.'

'Why ?' moaned Bellarius. 'Why would this happen ? How could this happen ?'

'That is not for the likes of you and I to know,' shrugged the false priest. 'Maybe it was because of the manner of research that was conducted on this planet. Maybe it was because of the remnant of some grand experiment conducted by the settlers of this world thousands of years ago, awakened by the power of the Storm. The Gods have their own designs for us mere mortals, and it is not our place to question our part in them – especially those of the Changer of Ways, whose minions held dominion over this world. But shouldn't you be happy, Bellarius ? You have been chosen – not to be some great savior of legends, of course, that was simply a convenient way to make you do what needed to be done.'

'But you have been chosen to be bestowed a power that only a few on this world have been judged worthy of,' Karalet went on, his voice suddenly filled with religious rapture. 'And you have been chosen again – this time by me – to become the new master of this world.'

'What ... What do you mean ?'

The black warrior lurched forward, still looking down on Bellarius' prostrated form, and the words he spoke next burned into the mind of the deceived hero :

'I can give you back your dream, little Bellarius. I can wipe away the horrible knowledge that is consuming you now. All I ask in return ... is your loyalty.'

Karalet held out his gauntleted hand toward Bellarius, open palm facing up. The mutant looked at the offered hand, transfixed. For a long time, the two of them simply stood still, while all around them, the twisted hordes continued to rend each other apart. Then, with trembling fingers, Bellarius reached out to Karalet's hand. The gauntlet clasped around his wrist, and Karalet rose his crozius toward the swirling skies. The weapon began to glow with fell power, and Karalet spoke words of a language that was at once unknown to Bellarius yet resonated with his soul -

and at the priest's touch, a golden light pulsed from Bellarius' wounded body, healing him as the holy man stirred his god-given powers to action. Bellarius rose to his feet, resplendent in his armor, and rose his sword high, letting it shine in the light of the sun, bright enough for all on the field to see. Behind him, Karalet, who had left his sanctuary at the risk of his own life in order to assist him, retreated, letting him do what he had been destined to do.

All over the field of battle, the soldiers saw the beacon, and they ceased their battle at once, falling to their knees before Bellarius' radiant form. The panic and horror that had filled them after the tragic demise of their lord was banished, and they remembered their place and honor. As one, they fell to their knees, bowing their head to their new sovereign. Childhood memories of the sleeping Lord's legend came back to their minds, and they realised the identity of this champion. Soon, they began to chant his name, over and over :

'Bellarius ! Bellarius ! Bellarius ! Bellarius !'

A sense of deep contentment washed over him at the sight, and he knew that all was well. The prophecy had been fulfilled, and the compact between the people of Etharic and the Gods had been restored, though it had come at the cost of every other Lord. In time, the Gods would send more, but until then it would fall to him to carry the Gods' words to the people of Etharic. He could hear them already, whispering in the back of his mind, letting their divine knowledge permeate his thoughts so that he could guide the children of Etharic to their rightful destiny ...

The ship hang in orbit around Etharic-1, alone among the wreckage of destroyed orbital platforms and other man-made satellites that had, somehow, survived the fury of the Storm. An expert eye, and one able to look upon what the vessel had become without going mad, would have recognized the hull as belonging to the Dauntless class of light cruisers, but it had changed much since the ship had left the docks of the Martian shipyard that had built her.

Now it was a sleek, predatory thing, its shape twisted by the daemon that had replaced its machine-spirit. Once, she had born the name of Liberation's Price with pride, and served as one of the defenders of the Parecxis system. But after her capture, the Forsaken Sons' Warpsmiths had summoned a powerful Warp entity and bound it within the hull. What had emerged from this unholy union was a monster of the void, a twisted and cruel reflection of the majesty the ship had once possessed, now called Price of Servitude by those who struggled to command it.

It had taken time for those assigned to the ship to obtain anything approaching mastery over it. Even now, dozens of crew members were lost each week to dark corridors and hungry walls of flesh. But the hold of the daemon had been lessened enough, through the use of sorcerous wards and ritual offerings, that it was possible at all for mortals to inhabit its holds. And the advantages were nothing to scoff at – indeed, without the daemon's instincts guiding the ship through the Warp, it would have been all but impossible for it to cross space without a Navigator. The ship also did not require as much qualified crew as its class would have indicated, leaving entire decks empty for its masters to fill with the spoils of their conquest. A skeleton crew of a few hundreds was enough to keep it running, where tens of thousands would have been required prior to its possession.

On the bridge of the Price of Servitude, Dark Apostle Karalet looked at the world he and his brother had claimed for the warband through an occulus threaded with fleshy veins and glass imbued with the wonders of the Warp. Where a lesser mind would have gotten nothing more from looking than a headache, he could see the patterns the occulus revealed. He had studied them extensively before they had even landed on the planet, learning the flux of energy on the world below, noting the places of power and those marked by ancient tragedies. Now, as he looked, he could see the consequences of what they had done written large upon the skein of the world's soul.

The sound of ceramite boots on the deck's metal drew his attention back to his surroundings, and he turned to face the only other soul aboard the ship worthy of the Gods' attention. As usual, when he saw the scaled, sea-green armor, he had to repress an instinctual surge of hatred, of desire to strike at the one in front of him and cast him down. But he resisted, reminding himself of the consequences such an act would have, even if he were successful – which was far from a certitude.

"If one of you returns without the other, I will kill him myself."

Such had been the last words spoken by Arken the Awakened One, supreme warlord of the Forsaken Sons, two of his lieutenants had left together on a crusade of conquest across the Wailing Storm. Karalet, formerly of the Word Bearers, and Dekaros, formerly of the Alpha Legion. Technically, Dekaros was in command of the warband's splinter group. Two hundred Astartes had been detached to his command, the maximum that could be loaded aboard the Price of Servitude with its diminished crew.

The two leaders both disliked the other, but it wasn't personal. If anything, it was a legacy of the Legions to which they had belonged before joining the Forsaken Sons and no longer owed any allegiance to. To Karalet, the Lord of Shadow was an individual woefully lacking in conviction, bringing others to his side by offering petty things such as wealth and temporal power. At the same time, Karalet knew that in Dekaros' eyes, he and the rest of the former Word Bearers in the warband were little more than fanatics, dangerously unhinged and unstable.

Part of him understood why the son of Alpharius would believe such a thing. He and his gene-brothers had always been ... enthusiastic in their convictions. There was something in the bloodline of Lorgar that made them more zealous than their cousins, and the revelation of the Primordial Truth had only exacerbed that trait. Even Karalet now recognized that he had let himself be carried away by the knowledge that he fought for the one Truth, and believed himself to be the champion of the Gods rather than their servant. But he had paid the price for that hubris in the battle for Asthenar, and been taught humility.

The flames of the Son of Calth who had felled him had burned his flesh, boiled his eyes away, and left him a charred wreck of mindless agony. But the power of the Gods, still coursing through his veins after the victory against a Dreadnought he had scored moments before his defeat, had kept him from death. The Fleshmasters had found him after the battle, shocked that he still lived at all, and brought him back aboard the Hand of Ruin. There they had worked to restoring him, using all of their craft to do so. Mundane healing had proved to be useless, and so they had turned to other means.

In a last ditch attempt to save him before putting him in one of the newly repaired Dreadnought chassis, they Fleshmasters had hooked Karalet's up to a drip of daemonic ichor and other Warp-born substances, letting the will of the Gods decide his fate. Though they had not told him, the Dark Apostle knew that he had been under watch by heavily armed servitors the entire time, ready to tear him to shreds if he ever lost his identity to the flux of Chaotic energy and transformed into a mutated, mindless Spawn. If such had been his fate, he would have welcomed death rather than suffer such indignity.

But Karalet had endured, and had risen from near-death as a new being, bearing the marks his trial had left upon his flesh with pride. During the agonized process of his rebirth, he had witnessed the true glories of Chaos, and been shown his place in the designs of the Gods. His was not the destiny of the conqueror, to bring fire and ruin to entire systems as he offered them up to the Primordial Annihilator in sacrifice. Nor was he to turn billions of weak-willed fools to the one true faith with fiery oratory and displays of temporal power. No, his part in the great plan of Chaos was as an agent of subtler, more select corruption. He was destined to be an artisan of souls, crafting others into champions of the Dark Gods by manipulating their paths.

It had been Dekaros who had worked in the shadows to increase tensions between the mutant lords and prepared the deployment of the two hundred Astartes under his command during the final battle. But it had fallen to Karalet to ensure that the battle would actually take place, to plant the seed of visions into the minds of the priest-cast serving the creatures calling themselves the Lords of Etharic. It had been his role to ensure that once the dust of the carnage fell back to the ground, there was still one mutant lord alive to control the hordes – one the Forsaken Sons could control themselves.

He had done so on Etharic, locating the lost soul buried beneath the ruins of the capital and digging it free before setting it down the path that had led it right in the middle of the conflict. With subtle touches of sorcery, he had lifted the veil of madness from the eyes of the ruined man. Each glimpse of the true horror of his reality had been deliberately calculated so that doubt would grow slowly within him even as his conscious mind dismissed them, until the final moment, when the Lord of Ashes had shattered the illusion and forced his creation to confront the full truth. When the Forsaken Sons had finally struck at the Sovereigns, Bellarius' mind had been unable to invent an explanation that fitted into his delirium, and his tortured sanity had emerged again.

That had been enough, for Bellarius Nemator, firstborn son of the last Governor of Etharic and last of his illustrious bloodlines, which went back to before the days of the Long Night, had never possessed the strength to face reality. Even before the Wailing Storm had severed the Sector from the rest of the Imperium, he had always preferred to flee the weight of responsibilities that came with his position. When the great hive-cities had collapsed in the quakes brought forth by the storm, when the mutagenic agents hidden in the subterranean laboratories had been released into the atmosphere, Bellarius Nemator had been drinking alone in his chambers, too drunk to even notice when the structure collapsed and he was trapped beneath tons of rubble.

And now, trapped once more in the sorceries Karalet had woven around his willing, desperate mind, he would never have to face reality again. The lie Karalet had created for him, where he was a prophesied king, was too strong a lure for him to resist. Bellarius' own mind would create the details of his past, and he would truly believe them to be the truth, just like all the other lords had believed their own rewritten memories. He would rule over the world of his ancestors, a puppet king to the Forsaken Sons, his own delusions spread across the planet by the strange powers bestowed to his kin by the mutagenic agents. He would send his subjects to the stars aboard primitive ships that the dark magi aboard the Price were teaching them to build.

These hereteks were posing as emissaries from the angelic warriors who had come to Etharic to help end the destructive civil wars of the previous lords, and offer the population of that world a chance to be part of something greater. After all, the best lies were the ones that contained a measure of truth as their core. Entrapped in the madness that had been the Gods' sole mercy on their world, these mutants would fight and die in what they would see as righteous crusades against horrid monsters, never aware of the truth. Communicating with their deluded lords would doubtlessly prove annoying, but the children of Etharic were strong enough that their service was worth such a price.

And even now, the Fleshmasters were at work on the corpses of the Lords the Forsaken Sons had slain on Etharic, piecing together the secret of their unique mutations and mind-controlling gifts. There was no telling what dark wonders the former Apothecaries would be able to concoct with such material at their disposition, but the Dark Apostle had no doubt that they would be useful to the future campaigns of the warband.

Karalet tore his attention away from the past and back to Dekaros.

'We will remain in this system for the next few months,' said the Lord of Shadows, 'but the hardest part of our work here is done.'

'All that remains is for our heretek servants to work, and for us to reap the rewards of our efforts,' agreed Karalet. 'Arken will be pleased with what you and I have accomplished here.'

'Yes ... But this is a minor offering at best,' pointed out the son of Alpharius, gesturing at the planet below. 'These mutants are good fighters for mortals, I will give them that ... But the warband already has plenty of bolter fodder, and we have shipyards working on building much better ships that these wretches will be able to put together.'

'You lack imagination, cousin,' replied Karalet, and he sensed Dekaros' anger at the jab, but ignored it as he continued : 'there is much more to them than simple military power. Their gift from the gods could, under the proper circumstances, be spread to other mortals ...'

The Lords of Shadows and Ashes both fell silent as they contemplated the implications of such a possibility. Though he had already considered them long ago, Karalet still felt a smile form on his lips at the mental image, and soon, a similar expression formed on Dekaros' face. Then they started to laugh together, a cruel and inhumane sound that promised the damnation of entire worlds –

with neither of them noticing that the greatest damnation was their own

AN : Behold, I live !

Well, that took me long enough. Turns out that writing a dream of madness and denial is much, much more difficult than it appeared to be at first. Who would have thought ?

So, how long did it take you to understand what was going on, and start to wonder what was actually happening through every scene ? Have fun reading the chapter again and try to imagine it ! I know I certainly did.

It's quite obvious that this chapter was inspired by the Flesh-Eating Courts of the Age of Sigmar, where the Ghoul Kings have pretty much the same abilities as the Lords have here. This ability just fascinates me, in a morbid and probably unhealthy way that is likely related to the time it took me to write this chapter down.

You might be wondering what the frak took me this long. I blame everything on the Chaos Quotes I have been writing on Spacebattles daily ! But do not worry, because I am going to stop writing these in a few days, once I have reached a thousand of the things (seriously, a thousand ! I have been writing ten of these snippets a day for more than three months !), and then I am going to be able to focus my writing time on actual stories. I am still not sure whether I am going to do another Warband of the Forsaken Sons chapter then or the Salamanders Index for the Roboutian Heresy, or even a short story (I have had an idea for one that would be fun to write yesterday ...), but whatever I choose, it will come up faster this time, though probably not this year.

On another note, I am still looking for more players for my games of Black Crusade. There are three games currently going on, each with two players :

Wednesday at 16:30 GMT

Saturday at 19:00 GMT

Sunday at 9:00 GMT

If you are interested in joining, send me a message, and we will see what can be set up.

Anyway, that's all for today. Tell me what you thought about this chapter in your review, ask me if you have any questions, and don't hesitate to tell me any ideas you have for the Forsaken Sons' adventures in the Wailing Storm !

And in case I don't post anything before the new year : Merry Christmas, everyone !

Zahariel out.