SWDnovel Chapter 219: Emperion (2)
Chapter 219: Emperion (2)
Adonis looked around the desolate, dark landscape. He noticed that the ground was not just rock. It was made of petrified titans, colossal beasts, and ancient, forgotten warriors. Millions of massive bodies formed the very floor of the abyss.
"Are all of these your people?" Adonis asked, gesturing to the petrified corpses.
"They are the exiled horrors of the cosmos," Emperion replied sadly. "The ones who refused to kneel to the Golden Light. The forgotten heroes, the betrayed kings, the monsters Ascalon feared. They sleep in the stone. They are waiting for a dawn that will never come."
"Then I will be their dawn," Adonis declared confidently. He limped over to the chained titan. "I need a new vanguard, Emperion. And you look like you need a new job."
Emperion stared down at the tiny human. "You want to command the exiled horrors? You want to command me?"
"No, I want to offer you a partnership," Adonis smiled. It was a wicked, terrifying smile. "A chance to burn Ascalon’s new Golden Heavens to the absolute ground. A chance to rip the Primus of Death in half. You have the raw power. I have the ambition."
"You have absolutely nothing!" Emperion roared, shaking his heavy chains. "You have no magic! You are bleeding on my boots!"
"I have my will. And my will is enough to break the world."
"Willpower does not snap star-iron, boy," Emperion scoffed. "These chains were forged from the core of a dying sun. They drain any energy that comes near them. They are completely unbreakable."
"Then we will find a different kind of energy," Adonis stated.
He placed his bare hand directly on the massive, freezing black chain binding Emperion’s wrist.
"Tell me about this Void," Adonis demanded. "If Ascalon did not create it, who did?"
"No one created the Void," Emperion explained, looking at Adonis like he was a madman. "It is the canvas before the painting. It is the absolute zero. It eats everything. Magic, light, sound. It consumes endlessly."
"If it consumes endlessly, then it must store that energy somewhere," Adonis reasoned.
"It stores it in the dark," Emperion said, shaking his head. "But it is completely untouchable. To draw power from the Void is to invite the absolute dark into your soul. It erases the self. It makes you a mindless, hungry thing."
"Ascalon thought my chaotic power would consume me," Adonis laughed. "He was wrong. My mind is my own. I conquer power. I do not let it conquer me."
"You are incredibly arrogant. Or extremely mad." Emperion said.
"Sanity has never won a single war," Adonis replied.
"You saved a demon instead of yourself," Emperion pointed out suddenly. "I saw the portal flash before you fell. You threw away your last breath of magic to save a woman. Is that the action of a conqueror?"
"She is my general, and she is my woman. An Emperor always protects his own. I promised my wives and Sirius I would return to my sanctuary. A true Emperor never breaks a promise to his empresses."
"Empresses?" Emperion let out a booming laugh. "You were cast into the infinite abyss by two supreme gods, and you are thinking about your harem?"
"They are not just a harem," Adonis corrected him sharply. "They are the foundation of my entire empire. Their devotion gave me the power to shatter the First Firmament. Ascalon called them dust. I will show him exactly what a storm of dust can do."
"You drew power from pure affection?" Emperion asked in genuine surprise.
"Yes," Adonis nodded. "Ascalon draws power from fear and forced submission. Primus draws power from decay. I draw power from those who willingly give it to me. It is a terrifying concept for a tyrant to understand."
"Perhaps," Emperion mused. "But there is no affection here, mortal. Only the cold."
"Then I will conquer the cold," Adonis said.
He gripped the black chain harder with both hands. He closed his eyes and pushed his consciousness outward. He did not seek light or warmth. He embraced the absolute emptiness of the abyss around him.
He felt the hunger of the Void. It was a primal, desperate need to consume everything.
"You are playing with oblivion, Kingsbane," Emperion warned, his voice laced with genuine concern.
"Oblivion works for me now," Adonis growled.
Instead of resisting the drain of the star-iron chains, Adonis reversed the flow. He opened his shattered spiritual core and allowed the raw, hungry darkness of the Void to pour directly inside him.
His veins instantly turned completely black. His violet eyes shifted. The purple irises were now surrounded by pitch-black sclera. The air temperature around him dropped to absolute zero.
"What are you doing?" Emperion demanded, stepping back as far as his chains would allow.
"Eating," Adonis answered with a wicked, terrifying grin.
The dark energy of the Void surged through his muscles. He did not use magic. He used raw, unfiltered, cosmic hunger.
He pulled the chain.
CRACK.
A hairline fracture appeared in the unbreakable star-iron.
Emperion’s eyes widened in absolute shock. "That is impossible."
"I told Ascalon the same thing," Adonis grunted, pulling even harder. "His understanding of reality is flawed."
CRACK. SHATTER.
The massive chain exploded into dark dust. Emperion stumbled forward, his right arm completely free for the first time in ten thousand years.
The titan looked at his freed arm. Then he looked at the tiny human standing before him, radiating the terrifying energy of the abyss itself.
"You absorbed the abyss," Emperion whispered in awe.
"No. I subjugated it," Adonis corrected him. "Now, I am going to break the rest of your chains. And then, you are going to wake up your friends."
Emperion let out a vicious smile finally appeared on his craggy face.
"Are you ready to be a hero again, Emperion?" Adonis asked.
"I was never a hero," Emperion rumbled, flexing his massive fingers. "I was a warlord. Just like you."
"Good," Adonis laughed loudly, the sound echoing endlessly into the dark. "Heroes hesitate. Warlords conquer. Welcome to the Chaos Order, titan. Let us go kill some gods."