"I look back on what I thought was my faith in the lies of the Church with a mix of bemusement, disgust and hatred. It is almost impossible to comprehend such naiveté, such wilful blindness, and yet I know it was not so long ago that I was but another of the Adversary's blinkered sheep.

Now, however, my eyes have been opened. And so, in challenge to the Adversary's prophets of old, I too shall put the revelations I've been granted into writing.

When I first saw the Master, I did not realize that I was in the presence of divinity. How could I, with my feeble mortal eyes, comprehend the truth ? Yet even then, I knew he was more than he seemed.

He came to the Imperial Palace in the guise of a mortal man, but even that lowly form could not fully conceal his glory. He walked through the doors, and none thought to stop him, until he came to the room where the one we then thought supreme held court.

I do not recall exactly why we were all gathered at the time. Something about the war, no doubt, but it doesn't matter. What I recall with perfect clarity, however, is when the doors opened to reveal the Master, and we all fell to our knees before him.

Then he spoke, and revealed unto us the truth of Creation. His words burrowed into our skulls, digging into the barriers of lies and ignorance that had grown there over our entire lives. He taught us of the True Gods, from whom all the worlds were born, before the Adversary usurped their place as rightful sovereigns of Creation. He taught us of the long war he had waged against this cowardly demiurge and his cohorts, to break the seals of lies and awaken the True Gods from their long slumber, so that Mankind might reclaim its place as their favored servants.

His words were more than mere sounds : they carried with them the truth of themselves, each showing us glimpses of that antediluvian epoch when the True Gods ruled over the cosmos. The pain was immense as he shared these visions with us, and I, like many others, ran. My pitiful mind could not withstand the sight of such magnificence, and I returned to my basest, bestial instincts as I sought to flee from what I did not understand.

But instead of smiting me and the other cowards for our unworthiness, the Master was merciful. With a mere gesture, he sealed the doors and locked us all in the throneroom with him, preventing us from escaping until we had all learned what he had to tell us. As we beat our fists bloody against the great wood panels, he continued speaking, until at last he was done, and we were each and everyone of us his loyal vassals, now and forever.

Then, and only then, did he shed his mortal guise and let us behold him in his true glory, letting us know the true nature of the being we now served. And we fell to our knees, screamed our prayers, and made sacrifices of those too weak to stop us."

"For all his power and glory, the Master must still act in secret, lest the minions of the Adversary strike him down with their cowardly tricks. To that end, today, the Master wove a great working around the Palace, to keep the rabble from realizing what great things are taking place within these hallowed walls, as well as to ensure none would question what happened to the servants, or why we remain within the Palace for so much longer than before.

This working used the Kaiser and his bloodline as reagents, their ties to the Empire turned into strings from which the Master wove the veil that shall hide his works. We watched in rapture as he unravelled them all, leaving only a remnant of the Kaiser to sit upon his throne – which the Master now uses as a vector to assume the aspect of this mortal sovereign in order to deceive the rest of the Empire, until the day comes when the truth can be revealed and all kneel before him in joyful worship."

"Tomorrow, we will at long last shed our human shells. The preparations for the Rite of Transfiguration are complete. Moving in secrecy, we've procured the reagents the Master requires, while those of us blessed with the required level of magical power have been taught the steps of the rite.

A great pit has been dug, displacing the useless flowers and rare trees which the Imperial Family collected for so long, and a complex arcane circle traced around it using powdered jewels from the royal vaults. There, under the light of the full moon, we shall be brought into a new existence.

I tremble with anticipation as I write these words. The Master told us that the Rite will liberate us from the weak forms the machinations of the Adversary entrapped our essence within, remaking our bodies into shapes fitting for the service of the True Gods.

The thought of all that was robbed from us, and our ancestors before us for countless generations, because of the Adversary's manipulations, fills me with righteous fury. But for all his deceit, soon the truth shall be revealed, and their schemes come undone.

I cannot wait."

"It is difficult to write, for these weak, mortal hands are no longer my own, and merely looking at them as I write these words fills me with disgust for the weak, feeble creature I once was.

Ten days ago, the Rite of Transfiguration took place. I, along with the rest of the court, laid in the great pit, naked save for the runes cut into my skin. I dimly remember that the pain of them bothered me at the time – yet another mark of how pathetic I was then, for such pain was nothing compared to what came next.

Under the Master's guidance, his acolytes sang, and bent the laws of the cosmos to his will. For three days, I was bathed in the primordial energies of the universe. I was blessed with visions of cosmic power, even as my frail body writhed and screamed in abject agony.

To my shame, I begged for it to end, before the last anchors of my world-view finally shattered and I was reborn, purified in the eyes of the True Gods. My body followed suit, becoming a bloody chrysalis that burst apart to reveal my new, glorious form. I awoke surrounded by my fellows, who had been transfigured as I had. We revelled under the night sky, listening to the Master's sermons while feasting on the flesh of the mages who'd performed the ritual, their life burned out to fuel our transfiguration.

Even now, the memories of that time of trial are fading, for even transformed as I am now, I cannot hold such truths into my mind – yet I know with absolute certainty that their mark shall remain forever upon me, a testament to the blessing I have received.

I find it difficult to think of the weakling man who wrote in this journal before as myself. His thoughts, his worries and fears, seem so small and meaningless to me now. That is why it took me so long before I could force my glorious new form to reshape itself into my previous appearance – and I am still ahead of many of my brethren, who have yet to manage it. The Master himself took notice of how quickly I achieved this, and I shall treasure the memory of his approving nod for the rest of my existence, which is now no longer constrained by the limited lifespan the Adversary put upon Mankind in order to limit its potential and keep it from becoming a threat to his reign."

"Today I had to go out again to procure meat for the court. I was tempted to devour the fat merchant who bought the meat for us, but I held back. Alexander devoured a vagrant last week, and for his crime of risking the Circle's exposure, the Master made an example of him.

Though it has been several moons since we were reborn, many of us still struggle with assuming our previous, lesser shape, but I am honored to be among those who manage it the best, and for that I was chosen for this role."

"News have reached us of the lesser creatures which fight in the Empire's name. The Master has told us that these beings have been kept in ignorance of the purpose they truly serve, so that the Adversary may not pry His secrets from their minds as they wage war against is pawns.

I both pity and envy these beings, for while they are kept ignorant of the glory they serve, they are able to fight the minions of the Adversary, whereas we must wait within the Palace."

"A great victory has been won. In the distant East, the entire capital of the Russy Federation has been turned into a bloody sacrifice to the True Gods. This, the Master told us, is another sign that the end of the Adversary's reign over the world is nigh.

Mortals call it the Solstice Event, as if mere words can encapsulate something of such magnitude. But their ignorance matters little. Soon, their eyes shall be opened."

"For the first time since his arrival, the Master has left the Palace. Before leaving, he told us that the Solstice Event has awakened some of his old servants, freeing them from the slumber in which they were cast by the slaves of the Adversary. Now that they are free, he must rally them to his banner once more, giving them the orders that will set in motion our ultimate victory over the Adversary.

There is … disquiet, in the Palace, without the Master's presence. But we shall endure."

"The Master has returned. His absence was a trial, for we had all grown so used to basking in his magnificence. Without him to suppress our new instincts with his unquestioned authority, the practice of duels re-emerged, and despite our regenerative abilities, several of us ended up dead. I, myself, killed and fed upon one of my fellows, who had once been married to a distant relative of mine.

When he learned of this, the Master was not displeased, much to the contrary. He told us that this was the natural way of things, long concealed by civilization's false pretences; that those who had died had proven unworthy of serving the True Gods."

"The Master tells us that soon, our wait will be at an end. His chosen will come to him soon, to bend the knee before him and carry his word into the rest of the world.

We have all heard of her, of course. Her deeds have echoed across the aether and social fabric alike. She is powerful, though the Master kept her ignorant of her role in his plans.

Soon. I can barely keep myself from drooling on these pages at the thought. My flesh shivers in hungry anticipation, yet I must contain myself just one little bit longer.

Soon, we will be unleashed, no longer needing to hide, free to indulge our sacred hungers. The mortals shall behold our glory, and the sound of their screams shall be the orchestra which heralds the True Gods' return. Those who are worthy shall join us, transfigured into servants of the True Gods. Mages shall be turned into priests, carrying out the rites by which frail human clay is remade into something purer.

Soon."

Extracts from the personal journal of Ambrosius Drachencraft, courtier at the Imperial Court, recovered from the ruins of the Imperial Palace.

September 3rd, 1926 – Castle Schwartzstein

In the courtyard of the castle, a bunch of children were playing, under the watchful gaze of their caretakers. The sun was high in the sky, warming the stones under their feet as two dozen children ran around, laughing and shouting at each other. If an adult had asked them what game it was exactly they were playing, each child would have had a different answer, each of them beyond the ability of an adult to understand – as was only right and proper.

One child, however, stood away from the rest. And, though it was in the nature of children to be self-centered and selfish, these were no ordinary children. One of them, a boy with red eyes and skin black as coal, left the group, running to the side of his friend.

"Kory ?" Vreta asked. "What's wrong ?"

The Counterfeit Saint, whose name had been given to her by that very boy, was looking into the distance at something only she could see, and tears were running down her cheeks.

"Tanya is hurting," she whispered. "The bad man has her, just like the bad men had me be-before. He's hurting her, and he wants to break her, and – and –"

She started shaking, sobbing, and Vreta immediately pulled her into a hug, holding her tight even as he fought his own rising panic. To the Nazzadi child, the idea that anything could threaten Tanya seemed impossible. Though he hadn't seen it with his own eyes, he knew she had killed Akhar-Zegog, the monster which had hunted the Nazzadi for as long as anyone remembered. But he also knew that Kory had seen Tanya fight other things than the Devourer of Hope, and he knew that she wouldn't lie about something so important – in fact, she had never lied about anything in the time Vreta had known her, not even the small, inoffensive lies children tell all the time.

Holding his friend tight, Vreta fell back to the lessons of his childhood, to the ways his people had followed for more generations than anyone now remembered. When monsters came, the children's job was to hide and wait for the adults to deal with the situation. And, if the children saw the monsters first, then they had to warn the adults.

"Let's go find Miss Elya," he suggested.

Before coming to the Empire, the Nazzadi had had no concept of prayer. The necessities of survival, and the bleakness of their situation on Nazza-Duhni, had erased any faith or belief system their ancestors might have held before the cataclysm which had ended their world.

But in the months since, the Nazzadi had learned many things from their Imperial hosts, including the concept of the Church and the faith most in the Empire – and the Division too, despite or perhaps because of the nature of their work – believed in. Getting the concept across the language barrier had been difficult, but the linguists had managed it in the end.

And so, as Vreta gently led his trembling, scared friend toward their caretaker, the boy found himself silently wishing that Tanya would be okay, hoping that someone, anyone would listen.

"I don't care about military regulations ! The Director's orb just vanished, and it wouldn't do that unless she was in danger !

… No, you aren't cleared to know how, why, or what that means ! All you need to know is that this is Division Y business, and that it's of vital importance that I get to her side immediately !

… I know she is in the Imperial Palace ! Why do you think I'm insisting so much ?! If she is in danger, then the entire Imperial Family is at risk !

… Just you try shooting us down, if you think you'll have better luck than the Progeny ! Serebryakov out !"

Communication from Lieutenant Viktoriya Ivanovna Serebryakov to Berun Airspace Command, September 3rd, 1926.

? – ?

Darkness. And then, light, weak and flickering, as awareness returns.

There is pain, steadily growing at the edge of my senses. A pressure, like claws weighing against skin at the very threshold of piercing through, as the will of a thing pretending to be a man tries to break in from the outside.

But it cannot. Not yet. I won't let it, and for now, my will is enough.

I am bound in great chains of shadow, unable to move, to act, to speak. Able only to watch, to listen, and to wait.

I sense great panes of sorcery beyond the edges of my prison, hiding it from view. On them, I can feel the oily touch of the architect of my imprisonment, painted with the Kaiser's endless agony. This, then, is how the presence of this malignant corruption at the Empire's heart was concealed for so long.

I watch as four figures gather before me, in the small circle of light that is all I can create in my diminished state. The Lonely Boy, who cannot understand others and strives for excellence in all things because he believes he must, achieving great results yet discarding every pursuit when he realizes he will never reach the top. The Salaryman, who found what he believes to be the answer to all his questions and uncertainties and applies it to everything, even as this focus pushes aside others. The Orphaned Girl, who seeks a life well lived as revenge against a capricious demiurge. And the Director, who has learned truths both eldritch and mundane the other three never so much as glimpsed.

These four are there but not there, for this place is not really a place. It is the construct of a fractured soul, the representation of a mind that has never been what most would consider normal. They are aspects of a singular existence, reflections cast by a single light through the prism of time.

They are themselves, but they are also me. But where I am bound by the arcane chains wrapped around me, they are free – free to move, to act, to speak, if only here, in this liminal space. For the chains were meant for me alone, and their maker didn't realize there was more than I to myself.

Silently, I listen to them speak. Though it looks like a conversation, it isn't : it is merely a succession of thoughts, voiced by each of the four in turn.

"The Kaiser is dead," whispers the Orphaned Girl. "We'll never be a knight now."

"No," refutes the Salaryman. "His fate is much worse than that, I fear."

"And ours won't be much better," says the Director. "We don't have much time."

"What can we do ?" asks the Lonely Boy, gesturing at the darkness around them.

"The wards kept our use of the Nazzadi orb from being detected, but Visha will have noticed the weapon's disappearance," says the Director. "She is coming to help us."

"Have you forgotten ? There is running water all around this place," the Salaryman points out.

"Somehow, I don't think she will let that stop her," smiles the Director.

"Alright, maybe," the Salaryman concedes. "But what can she do ?"

"That's the rub, isn't it," the Director frowns. "Endlose Nacht might give her an edge, but she doesn't have a dose with her. And even with it, the Not-Man is something unlike anything we've encountered before."

"I don't think he's stronger than the Dark Mother when it comes to raw power, but if he was behind the Heresiarch in Kemet, then we've to assume he's stronger than that old mummy was, and it took Weiss being supported by the Ritual of Correspondence to take that one down," the Lonely Boy thinks out loud.

"Based on what we've learned, it's clear now that we've only ever been a pawn in the rivalry between the Not-Man and Being X," the Orphaned Girl picks up the thread of thought, sneering as she speaks the name of her tormentor. "Unless Being X was actually fucking Nyarlathotep in disguise, playing both sides all along, but given the references to the 'Adversary', and what happened in Remula, I think we can safely discard that theory."

"Especially since, if it's true, then we are doomed anyway," the Salaryman throws in.

"So we have been a pawn for our entire second life," the Director scowls, before her eyes suddenly widen. "But when a pawn reaches the other side of the chessboard …"

"… it becomes a queen," finishes the Orphaned Girl, scowling. "We know. We have all played chess. But a queen is still a piece."

"Actually," says the Director with a bloodthirsty smile, "I was thinking that it is in the perfect position to jump off the board and cut the enemy player's throat."

There is a pause, as the other three consider the words of their newest kindred. Then, the Salaryman chuckles.

"I see where you are going with this," he says. "If you are correct, this might be our only chance."

"This might also kill us," the Orphaned Girl says. Out of the four, she's the one who sounds most apprehensive about the notion, for she fears and hates the afterlife's guardian in equal measure. "Even now, we know very little about how this all works."

"It might," the Director admits. "But the alternative is becoming a slave to an eldritch horror who'll use us to bring doom to the world, and I think we're all in agreement that's much, much worse ?"

The other three nod with various degrees of reluctance.

"Well, if we are to die, we might as well do it with style," the Salaryman sighs. Out of the four, he alone experienced death, and the idea of facing that awful moment of total impotence as something large and unstoppable approaches to crush him frightens him more than he lets on.

Defiance, even futile, is better than meekly waiting for the inevitable. In this, we are all in agreement.

And then, one by one, they disappear. First the Lonely Boy; then the Salaryman; then the Orphaned Girl; and finally, the Director, who looks up at me as she fades away.

"Don't fuck this up," she tells me – I tell myself.

And then she too is gone, and there is only me, because there was ever only me here. The pieces of myself come together, different perspectives becoming one at long, long last. I reclaim the fullness of my strength, and with it, I break the chains woven by another of the chessboard's pawns.

On one level, I feel myself physically straining against the links; on another, I break the complex, eldritch spell formula that suppressed the effects of the Kosmosblut. Both are real, and both are illusions. Truth and metaphor are fluid and inconsistent things here, where the dreams of a twice-born soul meet the thoughts of a nascent godling.

One by one, my bindings break, each one sending a shockwave that batters the obfuscating panes, causing cracks to appear and spread with each blow. When the last of my chains is broken, so too are the concealing walls, and I smile at the knowledge that, no matter what happens next, the plans of my enemy have been brought to ruin by this alone.

And I awaken.

September 3rd, 1926 – Imperial Capital Berun – Imperial Palace

I opened my eyes, and the shadowy tendrils that bound me burned in silver fire as power coursed through my body, reshaping my human shell into the towering form of the Lady of Stars. This time, there was no need for a Kosmosblut injection : the power was inside me all along, kept sealed by the spell the Grandmother had cast on me when she'd found me, hurt and confused, in the ruins of Moskva.

I stood up, summoning my orb to my hand. Inside my palm, the cane immediately shifted into the Moonlight Blade, casting its pale light onto my dreadful surroundings.

The Fiends recoiled from the radiance, shocked, hissing and snarling in pain and fear. They cowered in the shadows of the defiled throneroom, but the darkness was no shield against my gaze. Unlike the Werwölfe, who appeared either entirely human or completely alien, the Fiends showed a variety of in-between states, with limbs and faces replaced with those of their monstrous aspects, creating chimeras that somehow looked even worse than their fully transformed self.

I looked deeper, and saw their true nature, warped and evil, nothing left of the humans from which they had been created except the meanest echo, just enough for them to play the part. Perhaps, I thought grimly, enough for them to believe they were the same being transformed, rather than a beast that had killed and replaced whatever Imperial courtier had spawned them in their final, agonized moments.

I would have wept for them, had I not walked amidst the trenches of the Rhine, and beheld the ruination of Nazza-Duhni and Moskva. Compared to such horror, the death and damnation of a bunch of noblemen who had been born to wealth and privilege the likes of which the orphans I'd grown up with couldn't imagine was a small thing.

My perceptions extended beyond the room, past the wards which had shielded the Imperial Palace for so long, only to be shattered by my transformation. I sensed a clutch of familiar presences approaching, moving through the air at great speed, and knew that my companions hadn't abandoned me.

Further away, I could feel the thousands of souls who had been touched by the Lady of Stars. In Arene, in Bovariastadt, in the east where the Allied Forces still dwelled. A faith, not in a singular deity, but in the inherent potential and goodness of Humanity, in the strength of unity against the darkness. Yet I felt too the seeds of worship, and knew that I would have to attend these soon, lest I become the very thing I was so repulsed by.

But this was a matter for latter, if there was such a thing for me. I recentred my perceptions to my immediate surroundings, and focused them on the creature which stood before me, unafraid of me yet clearly not unaffected by my transformation.

"What a surprise," hissed the Not-Man. "I see that woman couldn't do anything right."

"The Grandmother did what you told her to do," I chided. "It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools."

He snarled, making a sound like a priceless painting being torn to shreds by someone who knew its importance and simply did not care. I saw then that it was not a man, and had never been a man. Such was merely the form the minds cursed with beholding it were putting on it in order to bear such an awful sight.

I looked up the temporal thread of its existence, and to my shock, I found that this creature, this being which had brought corruption and ruin to the heart of the Empire, was not much older than my own human body in this world. It had come into existence not as a babe possessed by an ancient spirit, but instead had appeared out of thin air, fully grown, to walk the lands of the Empire.

I looked further back into the past of a thousand years ago. There, I saw it – no. Not it. Another one, just like it, impossibly similar, but not the same. I saw it appear out of nowhere too, gather followers and turn them into monsters, before being hunted down and destroyed by an army of holy warriors, whose priests then set to work erasing all traces of its existence – only for one journal to escape them, and find its way to the Royal Wizard of the Allied Kingdom ten centuries later.

I looked even further back, following what I'd first thought to be echoes but now understood to be a pattern that had repeated itself for aeons. Again, I saw another version of the Not-Man appear, only to be stopped by those who thought themselves divinely chosen, but were in truth instruments of the entity I knew as Being X. Again, and again, and again, and again, and again; an endless procession throughout the ages of the world, stretching all across the globe. In Europa, in Kemet, in the Far East and the Americas and everywhere human beings had attempted to build civilizations, the Not-Man had appeared at some point. Every instance doing the same thing, over and over, never learning from the past – each acting exactly as if it were the first, even as their adversaries grew wise to their methods and tricks.

I saw the truth, then, and I laughed. Despite the cosmic implications of this revelation, I couldn't help it – it was all just so monstrously ridiculous.

"Have you finally gone mad, child ?" it mocked me. "Or is it despair from understanding your situation ?"

"I see you for what you are," I taunted it.

"I am the prophet of the True Gods," it proclaimed. "The harbinger and architect of their return !"

"No," I denied it. "You are not. You are not the herald of the Great Old Ones, tirelessly working in the shadows to usher in their return, reincarnated every time you are slain. You aren't even their alarm clock, waking them up when the stars are right, or even their ring tone. You are nothing more than the electrical impulse coursing through the clock just before it rings, and the Adversary has been hitting snooze every time one of you pops up for untold aeons !"

Alright, maybe I was stretching the metaphor somewhat. But I couldn't help myself. It was all just so wonderfully absurd ! Even that poor soul Lovecraft would have smiled, I believed, had he realized what the equivalent of Nyarlathotep actually was in this world, compared to the all-powerful, wicked deity he had painted in his works.

And I had another reason to win now, I belatedly realised. Being X had managed to deal with creatures like this one for thousands of years, and my pride wouldn't tolerate failing where this hack had succeeded for so long.

Petty ? Perhaps. But so long as it helped me win, I would take motivation from wherever it came.

"You didn't go to the Grandmother for help before the Solstice Event because you didn't know she existed," I pressed on, trying to anger the Not-Man to the point it made a mistake – unlikely, given its eldritch nature, but you never knew, and besides, it had spent decades walking among humans, so maybe it had picked up some of their bad habits. "Until the Heresiarch woke up in Kemet, you had no idea there were still remnants of your predecessors' attempts at destroying the world left."

"Do you think it matters ? You don't have the Adversary's power behind you," it spat. "Your power originates from me and me alone. Do you really think you can defeat me with it ?"

"I don't know," I admitted. "But neither do you, isn't that right ? Why else would you have the Grandmother seal my transformation before revealing yourself ?"

It shrieked in rage and frustration, and shed the bare pretence of humanity in which it had cloaked itself, shifting its true nature so that it became visible in three-dimensional space. As it did so, it seemed to grow, matching my own transformed stature – though in truth, it was merely changing the dimensional alignment of its being, bringing more of itself into what humans thought of as reality.

The shape it took was beyond the human brain to fully grasp, but I was so much more than that now. It had a humanoid basis, with three arms which ended in clawed hands (the fact each of them had the familiar five fingers was, perhaps, the most disturbing thing about the whole nightmare). Black tentacles erupted from its torso in an asymmetric pattern, each covered in eyes with slitted irises and mouths with black tongues and too many teeth. Where its head should be was another tendril, and a mouth that moved in ways no orifice designed by nature ever should.

It was, to put it bluntly, a vision of nightmare, one fit to drive any human seeing it running in terror.

I rushed at it with my Moonlight Blade held high. The weapon came down, only to be parried by something which shrouded itself in the guise of a sword whose blade was covered in a coating of human teeth, which burst into dust at the impact, revealing a metal underneath that I knew at a glance had been forged in a place where the laws of reality were very different from the ones I was used to.

But I saw, too, that the blade wasn't meant to be a weapon, just a tool, like an instrument attached to one of the robots we'd sent to Mars in my old world, repurposed for a violent purpose it hadn't been designed for. It had other such tools, kept hidden in other-dimensional space, meant to assist it with the goal for which it had been created, each more advanced than anything ever produced by Division Y or the Nazzadi people at the height of their power and knowledge.

But even the most advanced combat drone can be taken out of commission if you smash it with a big enough rock, and the Moonlight Blade was a very big, very sharp rock.

I disengaged, and struck again, and again, before needing to dodge the Not-Man's own blow. Seeing an opening, I let loose a stream of energy from my left hand. It moved out of the way, but hitting it hadn't been my objective : the attack spell struck the living throne, where the Kaiser and his wife had been bound into deathless torment, incinerating them both and freeing them from their suffering.

I felt the tottering remnants of the wards the Not-Man had woven around the Imperial Palace collapse completely with the destruction of their last anchor, as did their architect. It shrieked, in frustration and rage.

"Very well," it said, with words that made the Fiends around us howl in psychic agony. "If the subtle path has failed, then brute force will have to do ! I shall break you, and then do the same to all the others in this miserable pile of rocks you call a city, before going on to do the same to the rest of this world ! Even if you defy me now, it doesn't matter : you've already fulfilled the greater part of your purpose, and removed the Adversary's servants from the board !"

Wings made of panes of dead space stitched together with blood-red, squirming worms unfurled from its back, and it leapt upward. I flew in pursuit, and together, we burst out of the Imperial Palace's roof, crashing through the beautiful architecture and emerging to find the sky consumed by the alien stars and giant moon I had brought with me.

This time, however, the eldritch sky was struggling to manifest itself. Unlike what had happened in Arene, Bovariastadt and Moskva, the image looked like an illusion cast by a defective computation orb, flickering in and out of existence – a representation of my own battle against the Not-Man.

We briefly struggled like a pair of nightmarish eldritch wrestlers, before separating and hovering in the air, facing one another. In the distance, I began to hear the city's screams as Berun's population saw us and reacted with perfectly understandable panic. But, much as I lamented the damage this battle would inflict on the psyche of the Beriners, I couldn't spare any attention for them.

Because, no matter how much I'd insulted and demeaned it, openly and in my thoughts, the Not-Man was still a terribly dangerous opponent. Unlike what I had feared, though its true form existed in more than three dimensions, it wasn't an achronal being : its plotting was as bound by the laws of causality as any human being. But it was still a creation of the entities which had crafted the likes of the Dark Mother as nothing more than tools.

I didn't know whether I could win this battle, but I knew that, at the very least, I could fight. And, for now, that was enough.

The time for words, for taunts and insults, had passed. Now, all that was left was for one of us to kill the other.

"And I heard, as it were, the sound of thunder,

A distant voice saying : 'Come and see'.

My vision was transported as if on a bird flying across the Fatherland, and I saw.

And beheld a great beast of shadow, atop whose head was set a crown of lies, and beneath whose hooves laid the ruins of Empire.

I knew fear, then, for I knew in my heart of hearts that this Beast heralded the end of Mankind's dominion upon the world,

Until I saw too the star-born figure which fought it, and recognized the Lady of Stars, she who had brought deliverance to our benighted city.

And the heavens were rent asunder by the force of their battle, revealing the selfsame moon and stars that have become so familiar to us all.

And beneath the two warring godlings came the hosts of their champions in all their glory and horror.

I saw a duchess of ice, wielding the promise of the final ending.

I saw a girl, with skin dark as the starless night and eyes red as blood.

I saw a man with an arm forged of metal, striking with a blade forged of purest moonlight.

I saw a tamed wolf turned shepherd dog, his savagery turned to Humanity's protection.

I saw ordinary men, holding in their hands the power of stolen lightning.

And I saw, too, the horde of fiends that poured from the dark to face them.

I watched, dread battling hope in my soul as surely as champions and monsters did battle before me."

From the Testament of Dominique, written in Bovariastadt on September 4th, 1926.

"The first thing I heard was the explosion. I thought this was some kind of terrorist attack on the Palace itself. We had been warned to be extra watchful, what with so many foreign officials in the city for the conference, but nobody thought anything would happen here. I mean, if anyone was going to do anything, it would have to be closer to the actual conference, right ? Not here, at one of the bridges leading to the Palace.

So when I heard the noise, I thought I was dreaming at first. I turned to find where it was coming from, and saw the roof of the Imperial Palace explode, sending debris everywhere with enough strength that some of it slammed into the ground next to me – it was only blind luck that I wasn't hit.

Then I saw the Beast rise from the roof, and the Lady who pursued it into the sky. And I knew I wasn't dreaming, no matter how much I might prefer to be.

They fought with bursts of magic greater than anything I'd ever seen, and every blow inflicted more damage on the Palace beneath, while other wild shots went into the water, sending great waves and creating gouts of steam.

Then, as if things weren't bad enough already, monsters began to pour out of the ruined palace, things that looked as if they'd come straight from Hell, howling and shrieking and making noises I don't have the words to describe. I froze in place, like the rest of my buddies, and I'm not ashamed to admit it.

Then the people from Division Y came, plunging from the sky like Heavens' own terrible angels arriving to save us. The fliers dropped men with glowing rifles, and a young soldier in a Lieutenant's uniform who didn't carry any weapon, but turned into a big monster who still looked a lot better than the monsters. Without hesitation, they started to fight, and God help me, I raised my rifle and started firing.

It didn't do anything. Most of my shots hit : I wasn't selected to guard the Palace because my marksmanship scores were low, and the mass of monsters was so thick it would've been harder not to hit something. But when the bullets pierced through their … skin, the wounds disappeared almost immediately.

Still, I kept firing. Because … well, what else was I going to do ? Run ?

With all due respect, fuck that. I am still a soldier of the Imperial Army, even if … even if I failed in my duty of protecting the Palace in the most grievous fashion imaginable."

From the testimony of Private Gottfried, survivor of the Defense of the Schlossbrücke, recorded on September 9th, 1926.

September 3rd, 1926 – Imperial Capital Berun – Imperial Palace

Under the silver light of an alien moon, the skies of Berun were burning as titans duelled. Lightning arced as they clashed against one another, and the earth shuddered in sympathy with every blow.

Captain Johann-Mattäus Weiss fought with a strange detachment, as if his mind refused to process the implications of what his senses were telling him, letting his battle-instincts take over instead.

Objectively speaking, what was happening was not any worse than what he'd seen at Moskva. The monsters they were facing were similar to those the Southern Expedition had battled in the defense of Kheriaha, and the great horror the Lady was duelling was no more terrible than the Dark Mother at first glance.

But this was Berun. This was the Imperial Palace. It was supposed to be safe. The whole reason the Imperial Army had fought for so long was to keep the Fatherland safe, and the Palace was the Fatherland's heart, no matter how much its political influence had diminished in recent years.

And now, it was gone. Reduced to ruins, from which poured a tide of flesh-devouring monstrosities. The nightmares Division Y had worked so hard to contain were here, and millions were at risk.

No. No, he would not accept it. The horrors of Moskva would not repeat themselves here. He would not allow it.

Weiss screamed as he fought, his orichalcum arm blazing with power as he conjured a mage blade more powerful than anything he'd ever manifested. The Fiends hurled themselves at him as he hovered close to the ground – far closer than any self-respecting aerial mage should, but with the Lady of Stars fighting overhead, this was where he could do the most good without getting in the way.

Around him, the rest of the Director's escort were fighting too. Sergeant Barchet was leading his squad's fire, shooting into the mob of Fiends with their M-912 rifles. Grantz was there, tearing into monstrous flesh with eldritch claws. Entire packs of Fiends were frozen solid by Serebryakov, and Zerayah danced in the air between ranged attacks.

The war was supposed to be over, a small, distant part of him thought as he kept killing monsters. There isn't anyone left to fight.

So who did this ?

The monster in Grantz's mind howled as he fought the Fiends. Thanks to the years he'd spent as a Werwolf, Grantz could make out the mix of hatred for the Fiends, respect for the Lady of Stars, and utter terror toward her opponent his symbiote felt at the moment.

He didn't have a pack of his brethren with him this time, and that wasn't helping with the symbiote's feelings. The Director had brought only one Werwolf with her to the capital, as part of her wish to avoid frightening the other delegates with a blatant show of force. It had been a great honor to be selected for this duty : as a Phantom-type, Grantz was far from the most powerful of Projekt W's creations. But he was one of the first and most experienced, as well as, apparently, charismatic enough to look good at the conference.

They had all been warned to be on their best behavior, while also being vigilant for any attempt at sabotaging the conference or steal secrets. But even the Director's worst-case scenario failed to measure up to what was happening now.

He fought with organic blades, with beams of energy and tentacles. He fought with every trick he had learned, every bit of strength he could muster. Behind him, the Division Y troopers were firing into the horde, along with the poor bastards who'd the bad luck of being assigned to guard the bridge today. That they hadn't turned and run was a testament to their courage, and Grantz hoped they would survive this day.

Something he wasn't sure he would be able to. There were dozens of Fiends pushing toward the bridge, with more emerging from the ruins of the Imperial Palace. Lesser entities were manifesting as well, minor manifestations of the Mythos slipping through the cracks in reality caused by the clash of the two godlings above. They were little more than vermin to the Division Y personnel, the kind of beasts routinely purged by patrols in Castle Schwartzstein, but they were a distraction the handful of defenders couldn't afford.

No matter, Grantz decided. He wouldn't fall back, and he wouldn't fail. He had gone through too much to die here, with the end of the war in sight.

So he drew on that determination, on his sense of duty, on his instinctive hatred for the Fiends, on his anger and sorrow for all that he had witnessed – and he kept fighting, even as claws and fangs and other things tore into his flesh.

And, as Grantz kept fighting underneath the light of the Lady of Stars and the horrid Beast she was duelling, he began to change. It started in the depths of his being, where the mortal man and the Mythos being met. Covered in Fiend blood, surrounded on all sides, Grantz and the monster within were more in synch than ever before, and the line between the two of them faded more and more, until, in the madness of this awful battle, it disappeared completely.

Such was the confusion of the battle, nobody noticed it at first. The Phantom-type Werwolf grew, matching the largest Fiends in size, while his claws lengthened and became even sharper and more vicious. His hide paled, going from a fleshy pink to bone-white – or, perhaps, moon-white. The blades which grew from his wrists thickened and lengthened, cutting through Fiendish flesh even more effectively than before, propelled by increased strength.

Yet these changes were nothing compared to the gift which revealed itself when something large and fast slammed into Grantz. The impact should have born him to the ground, yet he remained unmoving, while the Fiend which had body-checked him ripped apart, the entire kinetic energy of its charge redirected into it.

He blinked with all five of his white, pupil-less eyes. Then, with barely an instant of pause, Grantz kept killing Fiends, wielding his new abilities with the same instinctual ease as right after he'd undergone the Rite of Union, in what might as well have been another life.

Zerayah's mage blade punched through the skull of something with too many eyes, and she threw the twitching corpse into the path of a towering cyclops with mana-enhanced strength.

Every enhancement spell her orb could support was coursing through her body at the moment. She moved with preternatural speed, the movements of the monsters around her seeming slow and sluggish to her accelerated perceptions.

She tore through the Fiends like a living storm, matching Weiss' own carnage. The Imperial-born mage had more raw power available, and could channel it more effectively thanks to his orichalcum arm, but Zerayah was a Nazzadi, who had reached adulthood on her people's death-world.

To a Nazzadi, fighting like this was a dream come true. For generations, her people had been prey for the monsters haunting the ruins of their world. Only when the Director had come and slain Akhar-Zegog had they dared think that their predators could be killed. That was why, when she had offered to teach them the magic of her people, every Nazzadi with the required mana had seized the offer with both hands, and thrown themselves into training whole-heartedly.

In Bovariastadt, they had come after the population had already suffered the effects of indoctrination, and had needed to break the chains binding their wills. In Moskva, there had been no one left to save, and all they had been able to do was put to rest the beasts created from their flesh and avenge them by striking the Dark Mother down.

Ever since Operation Gottesmörder, Zerayah had been haunted by the knowledge of how many people had died as a result of the Solstice Event. But here and now, they could still protect the people of Berun, and so she kept fighting, using every bit of mana she could squeeze out of her D-24.

Between the mental enhancement spell and the chaos of battle, time began to blur, one instant merging with the next into a single, eternal moment of struggle.

Then, as she cut a reptilian monstrosity in twain, she saw it, in the corner of her eye.

She saw the Moonlight Blade pierce through the Beast; heard it scream as it burned in silver fire. The howls of the Fiends shifted from rage to horror as their Master fell from the sky, pushed down by the Lady of Stars' impaling blade. The two combatants hit the ground like a meteor, and a wave of moonlight erupted from the point of impact, burning the Fiends to ash but leaving Zerayah and her companions untouched.

Amidst the all-encompassing radiance, the scream of the Beast abruptly cut off.

Silence fell, as Zerayah found herself no longer surrounded by foes. All at once, the exhaustion of battle caught up with her, and she nearly fainted as her enhancement spells dissipated, her mana reserves completely drained. Everything hurt : her limbs, her head, her magic (which she hadn't thought was possible, yet here it was). Never before had she pushed herself this far, not even in Moskva.

As she was about to collapse, a pair of white clawed hands caught her with unexpected gentleness. She looked up and met the five-eyed gaze of a pale giant staring down at her.

"Grantz ?" she managed to croak out.

The Werwolf nodded, the gesture utterly out of place coming from such a being.

"The Director," Zerayah murmured, darkness creeping in at the edges of her vision. "We have to … check …"

Visha's uniform was torn and ragged, exposing her skin to the air. Fortunately, there was no sunlight to burn her, thanks to the alien sky the Lady of Stars had brought with her. How exactly the Director had managed such a transformation, given she most definitely hadn't been carrying Kosmosblut with her into the Imperial Palace, the Untote had no idea, but that didn't matter right now.

Her hands were covered in frost, her fingers tipped by razor-sharp icicles hard enough to tear through the throat of a Fiend. But that wasn't needed anymore, because every last one of them had been annihilated by her Lady's latest spell.

She touched down near the crater where the Lady of Stars and her foe had landed, and saw her mistress rise, still in her transfigured form, her Moonlight Blade gently glowing in her celestial hand.

Visha waited for the Lady of Stars to disappear, replaced by the Director's human self. After all, that was what had happened every time she'd transformed before.

But seconds passed, and turned into minutes; and still, the star-specked form of the Lady of Stars remained, hovering above the ruins of the Imperial Palace, looking down at the city of Berun with what Visha was fairly confident was a wistful expression on her night-sky-wrought face.

"Oh, Tanya," Visha whispered. "What have you done to yourself ?"

"What I had to do," the Lady of Stars replied, and Visha jumped as she realized she had been listening. "Or, rather, what I believed was right. Whether I was correct or not ... that remains to be decided."

September 3rd, 1926 – Imperial Capital Berun

As General Eric von Lergen approached the ruins of the Imperial Palace, it took every bit of his willpower not to empty his stomach – out of stress or sheer terror, not even he knew for certain.

It was a miracle there hadn't been any major rioting yet, mostly due to the fact that everyone was cowering in place and praying. Well, that, and the calming influence of Major Degurechaff whilst she was in her transformed form – nevermind the fact that such should be impossible after the battle of Moskva, based on every report he'd read from Doctor Iosefka.

In the wake of the disaster, High Command had taken charge, with Zettour and Rudersdorf sending orders to the vast security forces already mobilized for the conference. Reinforcements had been summoned from nearby garrisons, with orders to provide humanitarian help to those who needed it and enforce the peace. Lergen had made sure that the orders were very clear that anyone causing trouble wasn't legally responsible for their actions and should be treated as gently as possible so long as it didn't endanger others, drawing on some obscure protocol initially written in case of an enemy of the Reich using some kind of mind-altering substance to cause chaos.

Mages were flying in, helping putting out fires and dealing with car crashes and other accidents. In a way, it was heartening to see the aerial mages using their talents for something other than violence for once.

Nobody knew what was going on, and that wasn't an acceptable state of affairs. This was the capital of the Reich, and they had visitors from all over the world. It was another miracle that they hadn't all fled from the city yet.

So, someone needed to go see what was going on, and for his sins, that someone was Lergen. Intellectually, he understood why : he had more experience of directly interacting with Division Y and Mythos magic than anyone else in the Imperial Army, due to his participation in the Southern Continent, Remulan and Eastern campaigns.

But, emotionally, he had very much wanted to scream at Zettour when the old bastard had told him that they needed him to go to what had, until very recently, been the Imperial Palace, and figure out what the hell had happened that had made every mana detector in the region go crazy with readings every engineer swore weren't supposed to be possible.

He walked through the military blockade cordoning off the area without trouble, then went past the pockmarked Schlossbrücke and onto the islet where the Imperial Palace had stood this morning. A group of Division Y troopers stood guard on the other side, and to his mild surprise, he recognized the one leading them.

"Sergeant Barchet," he saluted.

"General Lergen," the veteran replied with a sharp salute. "It's been a while, hasn't it ?"

"That it has. I don't suppose you have any answers as to what happened here ?"

"Beats me, I'm afraid," the sergeant shrugged. "One moment, I was standing guard over the eggheads, the next, the Lieutenant started shouting something about the Major being in danger, and we were carried across the city by the fliers before being dropped here, with a bunch of monsters coming out of the Palace and the Lady fighting … something. So me and the lads didn't ask questions and opened fire."

"I see. And where is the Major at the moment ?"

"She came down inside and hasn't come out yet," Barchet replied, pointing a thumb at the ruins. "Miss Zerayah came out a while ago and told us to keep watch and send whoever came to investigate inside – guess that's you."

"Lucky me," Lergen whispered, though given Barchet's chuckle, not quietly enough.

Out of habit, he looked up at the heavens, only to be met with now-familiar constellations and a too-large full moon. Unlike the broken skies above Bovariastadt, this phenomenon only seemed to extend to the islet where the Imperial Palace had been built, which Lergen supposed was a (painfully small) silver lining to this whole catastrophe.

With a sigh, Lergen continued to walk, watching his footing as he marched. The inside of the Imperial Palace was as devastated as its outside, the rubble still warm with the heat of battle. Surprisingly, there was no trace of whatever it was Division Y had battled here, which Lergen assumed to be the result of such remains having been completely incinerated.

After a few moments of trying to navigate his way through the ruins, Lergen heard the sound of someone clear their throat and looked up sharply, one hand moving to his service weapon by reflex.

Lieutenant Grantz looked almost exactly like he had when Lergen had last met him in Russy. The only change to his appearance was his dress uniform, whose completely intact state clashed rather brutally with their devastated surroundings. And yet, Lergen knew immediately that there was something else different about the younger man.

"General," Grantz saluted.

"Lieutenant. Has something happened to you ? You seem … different."

The Werwolf smiled ruefully, and despite his familiarity with Division Y's supersoldiers (however unwitting it might be), Lergen had to check the impulse to take a step back at the sudden show of (perfectly ordinary) teeth. Yes, there was definitely something going on with Grantz.

If pressed to put into words, Lergen would have described it as akin to what he'd felt the first time he had encountered the supersoldiers of Projekt W. It was as if the tolerance he'd built up to their threatening presence had been stripped away, leaving him just as nervous as he'd been in those distant, halcyon days when he had only needed to worry about the war pitching his homeland against the rest of Europa.

"Noticed it already, did you ? I guess I should have expected as much from you. Yes, something has changed. We still aren't sure what exactly, but it doesn't seem bad. I'll need to check in with the occultists back home once things have settled down."

Which wouldn't be anytime soon if Lergen was any judge.

"Anyway, please follow me, sir. The Lady sent me to guide you : we don't want you to get hurt walking around."

"After you, then, Lieutenant."

They walked through the maze of collapsed and burned-out wreckage, passing God alone knew how many ancient treasures of the Fatherland, now reduced to worthless slag, until they reached what Lergen was sure was the center of the ruin.

There, the Lady of Stars sat on a throne of debris transmuted into a strange black material dotted with inner stars eerily reminiscent of her own body, with Lieutenant Serebryakov standing at her side like a queen's lady-in-waiting. Nearby, Zerayah was laying down on what looked like a pile of torn curtains. If not for the slow rise and fall of her chest, Lergen would have feared for the Nazzadi girl's life.

"Major Degurechaff," he saluted her.

"Colonel Lergen … no, it's General now, isn't ?" she replied, cocking her head to the side as she inspected him, and he suppressed an internal quail at the weight of her inhuman gaze.

For a moment, it nearly dragged him back to the endless field of stars he'd witnessed when first meeting her eldritch gaze in Arene, but through a considerable effort of will, he managed to anchor himself in the here and now.

He swore she smiled then, as if he had passed a test of some sort.

"It is good to see you. I expected you would be the one the General Staff would send."

"What happened here ?" he asked, trying not to think about the implications of that. "And where is the Kaiser ?"

"The Kaiser is dead," she said sombrely. "He died years ago, and was replaced by a … a Mythos creature of great power, is probably the best way to explain it. It turned out that the Albish' story of the 'Not-Man' was more than their Royal Wizard's delusions."

"Explain," he ordered, doing his best not to sound terrified at the fact he was apparently giving orders to a living god, or that the ramblings of that crazy old man who'd tried to kill him in Remula had anything true to them.

And she did. Lergen's headache grew with every word, and by the time she was done, he was torn between screaming due to his agonizing migraine, and because of the bone-chilling horror he felt at her tale.

AN : I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Based on my notes, there are three more left to write, then the story will be over.

I hadn't planned for Grantz's transformation, but he managed to surprise me, which is always a pleasant surprise as an author. For those of you unfamiliar with CthulhuTech, the setting from which I ripped off the Werwölfe, what happened to him was that he underwent Metamorphosis, turning from a Phantom into a Wraith (you can find the official illustration on the SB thread). Usually, the process takes a lot more time, but I feel the circumstances justified something a bit more dramatic.

Normally, this is where I would ask for your thoughts and suggestions, but I'm afraid things are more or less locked in now. Hopefully you will enjoy the finale.

Zahariel out.