Его не звали, но он приперся / They never called, yet he is here: Интерлюдия четвертая: "Прощание" - 1

Interlude four: "Farewell."

Camrad_RIP 21.09.23 в 20:18

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Camrad_RIP 21.09.23 в 20:18

It was always a melody to him.

Camrad_RIP 21.09.23 в 20:18

A melody that had been born out of the moans and cries of millennia ago, emerging from the streams of pure power and human passions along with the very existence of his person. One and the same melody, gradually becoming more complex, more whole, more complete, more comprehensive, drawing in other melodies, turning them into its likeness, giving them the same tone, the same shade of sound as it had originated in those infinitely distant ages. In time, when the consciousness of the spawned something became more and more complex, moving from empty instincts to complex behavioral patterns, acquiring what mortals living in the material world could call reason, the melody finally found its perfection.

Camrad_RIP 21.09.23 в 20:20

He, in turn, had found a purpose, a singular purpose that allowed absolutely everything for its attainment - just like any of his kind. Each of them had found that purpose, always the same, always different for each of them. From the simplest of the inferior, born only a second ago, to the almost omnipotent Masters, beside whom he was like a newborn wisp, they all shared that purpose, even if they did not yet realize it. To acquire, to the very root, that which made them - them, that which raised and lowered, resurrected and destroyed. Whether it was Agony, Fear, Sloth, Gluttony, or the much-loved Lust, the essence of Vice, its true essence, remained the same for all who ascended.

Camrad_RIP 21.09.23 в 20:22

Every soul, every feeling, every experience, and every existence became fuel, wood for an unquenchable flame that will burn forever as long as there are still those who will serve as fuel for this flame. A flame that your very existence longs to give to the entire universe, to show the truth that foolish mortals refuse to recognize, avoiding their happiness with all their might. They are the source of the fire, the origin of the fire that has nothing to do with the quintessence of annihilation we used to call the Flame. No, the flames of Hell were not fire. They were of a different nature, but they remained a forge and a furnace, a potter's wheel on which the newly converted souls were shaped, hardened, and reshaped.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 05:52

Funny, but the creatures most hated by foolish mortals who didn't realize the inferiority they were trying so hard to rid themselves of were the ones who depended on the real world the most. Without souls, there is no Hell, or rather, there is no fleur, which is full of the melody that souls exude, and flair is everything. Once long ago, in those short fragments of eternity, when he was just learning about the universe, he managed to snatch a piece of the thoughts and aspirations of several Heroes summoned from the other world.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 05:54

There were also those who, in their delightfully impudent chuckle, turned to Vice for power, childishly naïve, expecting either not to pay or to pay the lowest rate, not realizing that by opening their souls to them, by opening them to the quintessence of bliss, the distilled and materialized ultimate goal of all existence, they had lost the right to turn back. As it must be, as it has always been, as it will be forever and ever - souls are generated, manifested in the matter of the created world, to be later in their power. Every essence that did not enter any of the Domains, every groan, every beat, every thought and passion that flashed past their attention is a terrible insult, an insolent abuse of the essence of being, of creation itself.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 05:56

From the same memory of the summoned, he managed to extract a strange association that compared their tribe to a term similar to that of the technological worlds. The children of the other sky compared the devils to the magical analog of a self-aware neural network. Extremely complex, branching, all-encompassing, yet never born to start living. The devils were inherently farther from humans than any undead or bloodsuckers, but at the same time, they were immeasurably closer to typical planar creatures - creatures of souls and feelings that never had feelings of their own.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 05:57

The human consciousness is banally unable to cover the whole range of their thinking, to look at the world from the right angle. Even the strongest of those who see can understand only the tip of an iceberg, the crown of a giant tree, the surface of a sea surface. Only another member of his species is able to understand the devil, and the rest of us can only react, speculate, and assume. They understood mortals many times better than they did. They played their melody on the strings of other people's souls.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 05:59

A different one for each of us.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 06:00

The melody was playing in this city at this moment and an hour had been prepared for a long time. The artists were carefully selected, and the orchestra formed the first notes, testing their sound in trial and error. The chords merged to achieve an acceptable sound, guiding the fingers of the musicians and the voices of the choral ensemble. This melody was perfect if only because it did not matter at all which way its sound would be directed, how exactly they decided to interrupt it - any outcome, any choice, any variant, from the most crushing of victories to humiliating defeat, was still equally acceptable, equally perfect.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 06:02

Isn't that why their tribe is so hated by mortals? Is it not this realization that makes them shudder with terror at the mere thought of opposing them, of trying to play the same symphony with them? The realization that the one you have chosen as your enemy cannot lose, that he wins even if he is defeated? Nothing makes a living and intelligent being as angry as the realization, even if deep inside, not revealed even to the one who realized it, that any of your actions, opposition, or even complete apathy and submission will still become fuel for the fire of the domain that has chosen you.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 06:04

And yet, and yet....

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 06:04

Among all the variations of melody, there are and will be those that are still sweeter, longer, purer, and more desirable. Were it not so, all the inhabitants of Hell would simply do nothing, for nothing would bring as much passion as anything else. No, there is always something to desire, to desire more than you have. Once long ago, maybe millennia ago, maybe a second later, he had wished for the Eternal Empire, wished for its Emperor and all his blood, wished for these lands and the mortals who had built their nest of destiny upon it.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 06:07

The limit of the ideal remains unattainable because while your melody is playing, all the other participants in the performance are also playing, adding their notes. To calculate all other compositions in all variants, adjusting your music to all possible outcomes is the sweet molasses of an unfulfilled dream that grows farther and farther away with every step. A place of concentration of the powers of mortals, the embodiment of the will of their rulers, imbued to the last stone with sophisticated magic and the elusive antiquity of primordial Law, is more than capable of playing in a rather ramified manner.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 06:30

The melody gradually slips away, forced to become simpler and simpler, becoming more and more bland the fewer conductors of his will remain. His children, his toys, his creations, and his slaves. Each of them cherishes the dream of turning their situations around, turning states inside out. Each one has to leave his dreams as dreams, for as long as he owns the Domain, as long as his Chorus sings, as long as each of the cells of the common Bank is assigned to his essence, it is his will that decides who they are, what they want and what they think about. Even those who can afford, by virtue of accumulated power or their choir, to think different thoughts, hiding them behind dozens of layers of subservient deceit, are only deceiving themselves.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 06:32

He is Authority.

Camrad_RIP 21.09.23 в 20:22

He is Desire.

Camrad_RIP 21.09.23 в 20:22

He is Lust.

Camrad_RIP 21.09.23 в 20:22

He is Sovereign.

Camrad_RIP 21.09.23 в 20:23

But fewer and fewer are his subjects. More and more have to be put at stake in the name of the melody for fear of cutting it short, of failing to reach the dizzying crescendo. Those who have been marked by him, dubbed Legends in the mouths of mortals, are dying. The number of the Worthy who have managed to rise above the masses is gradually decreasing, and the ranks of the forced subjects who have already acquired reason and ambition but have not accumulated any significant chorus and have not developed their skills are thinning. There are almost no toys left. The mortals filled with Lust and borrowed power are dying, unable to hold on to the power given to them, giving in and falling, with no chance of getting back on their feet.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:07

Mortals spare neither themselves nor others, defending their right to see the world in the same old colors, ugly and bland, defending the gray and dull reality, dying for the right to die, never realizing that they are ready to give them everything for almost nothing, because any price next to the priceless loses its immensity. It is pleasant, funny, and delightful to watch them tossing, blind, and broken from birth creatures that very soon will become something else, more worthy.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:14

But those punches, those jabs...

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:14

His will is stretched over the whole stolen city of the doomed. He gropes it with a thousand thousand gazes, looking out of the eyes of each and everyone who has just come here with his name and power in his heart. And fewer and fewer of those eyes remain, more unstable the melody, more quiet the notes played, more ephemeral the invisible ties that gradually drag the harnessed prey to the heart of his Domain, himself. The higher the losses, the more often and more clearly he has to invest his strength, realizing perfectly well that he is betting on the successful note already the very last bet - himself.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:15

Otherwise, in a material world devoid of sound and sensuality, everything would have ended long ago. The incarnate celestials can always condescend to their blind flock, whereas they would all have nothing to counter such an argument. You cannot interrupt the sound of the melody of thunder and crashing rocks with just the sound of a thin flute. The whole song, the whole composition, belonged to him alone, to his domain and his will, and he alone was to bear the responsibility, to accept the burden of defeat that would inevitably come if he played by the usual rules.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:17

No one plays by the rules, ever.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:17

Every single inhabitant of the familiar universe, every embodiment of feeling that dared to come into reality, not for bread crumbs, not to show the true path to a hundred or two blinded souls, but for something worth any sacrifice, was sure to change the battlefield to something that would be more convenient for them. To cut off another's will, to confuse and alienate the Heralds and their creators from the piece that had already been grabbed, to prevent them from taking what had been taken.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:18

He cut it off.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:18

He took.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:19

But this burden, lulled by his singing, is still awake, still fluttering the delicate web of tenderness and promises, refusing to open its eyes and see all the beauty of intimacy, all the ecstasy of expectation that will finally come to an end, never to stop again. And he continues to embroider new and new patterns with inaudible notes, continues to look with myriad eyes, to hear with innumerable ears, to collect and bind, to take what he desires, and therefore a priori belonging to him, just not knowing it yet. His creations continue his melody, so much belonging to him as longing to take his place.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:32

His dance, his passion, his eternity, his delight, his Lust.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:33

He's watching.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:19

And he sees.
* * *

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:19

"From the side!" a scruffy bass yells a scruffily dressed barbarian mercenary, shielding a fellow soldier from a spiked tentacle, already severed but still searching for something to grab onto and inject the flesh-eating hallucinogenic poison. "From the side, you blind-eyed meger. He's hitting from the side! Side!"

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:34

"On the spear!" Another mercenary, younger and weaker, shouted, trying to hold the creature from which the tentacle had been cut off at a distance from the spear shaft, which was crackling with tension. "Get him on the spear, slow the bastard down, he's aaaaaaaaaaah!!!"

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:37

The intersection of the two largest streets in the central quarter was the scene of another massacre, of which there were countless. The human counterattack, sent by the corps that had managed to repel the first waves of the attack on the central city government, was overwhelmed at this intersection, first by a crowd of Lust-crazed cultists and the citizens simply affected by the fleur and then by several dozen elite creatures and a full corps of what in Hell was a line infantry. Unable to hide their movements from the devils, the humans and some number of non-human races were surrounded but no longer had the advantage of the fortified and enchanted walls of the city government on their side.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:47

Perhaps now, each of them was cursing mentally that titled bastard, who, with his authority and uniform, had forced the decision to counterattack. They were sent for slaughter, even if they didn't realize it right away, because there were almost no elite fighters among them, and the unit itself consisted almost entirely of mercenary units of various degrees of fame and a certain number of regular army officers. Someone just needed to distract the devils while a smaller and better-equipped squad tried to breach the defenses of the nearest ritual point, a report about the importance of which came directly from the Palace.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:49

"Hold formation, you infidel cattle. Hold scum!" Time after time, the squad leader applies the Commander's abilities, working to burn out his reserve but still pulling off the most massive effects of the flare, overpowering them, preventing his surrounding companions from finally falling into depravity and perishing without a fight at all. "Stand until Victory!"

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:51

The slogans are primitive and stupid because even without the education of a tactician, it is clear that victory is very far away and defeat is close, but the class skill still works. Experienced Commanders or Captains can give not single cheers but whole rousing speeches to strengthen both will and body with orders and even to work instead of Benefics, but he has only recently gained the second class and have not had time to develop it to perform such a thing.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:53

The three brothers bore the family name of Cauldron, even though their father, who had been the commander of the squad before them, had been given that name as a nickname, noting the amazing ability of the old ruffian to cook divinely tasty Alishan pilaf literally on his knees in the open field. Now Cauldrons, who had long ago received citizenship of the Empire and had ties with a dozen small and even a couple of large noble families or merchant guilds, were eager to go back to their childhood. To eat the same pilaf with meat, to listen to their father's fables, to absorb the science of the squad instructors, and not to know any grief.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 09:58

And instead, they have to survive, trying not even to save themselves but just to sell their lives with not such a shameful bill as they are being charged now. Sadly, they're just slaughtered like a ferret in a chicken coop, losing only rank meat. All the strongest creatures keep their heads down, working from a distance or approaching the formation of people only for a couple of moments, leaving back with a blink. And there is nothing they can do because there is no strength to push through the defense of enemy commanders, and there are no normal amulets. Only they and their common grave.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 10:00

The middle Cauldron, a tall and stubby mustachioed man of about forty winters of age, waved his saber relentlessly, filling it with his power, creating a veritable cocoon of steel-colored flashes, preventing the two ordinary creatures from coming within striking distance. Their claws look imposing, but their hands are more or less the same proportions as a humanoid's, so it's easy to keep a distance. He cut off the only tentacle on the two of them, and now he was slowly increasing the number of wounds on the heavily armored pseudo-bodies.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 10:05

A sudden change of stance and a slightly raised shoulder allowed him to take a throwing needle on his hardened and enchanted shoulder pad, fired by the hand of a foolishly smiling black beauty with a completely blank stare. Maisa, his younger brother's mistress, had been one of the first to fall under the full control of one of the distant creatures, and his brother had been foolish enough to hesitate, not to beat it to death. It was easy to find a new bad warmer, but he wouldn't find a new brother - the poison on Maisa's blades, nicknamed Olive for the color of her skin and even stopped cutting off her fingers for that nickname, was always excellent.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 10:25

A swing of the saber, a risky approach, a blow of the stiletto, hidden for the time being in the wide sleeves of the Alishan free cloth garment, which is stretched over the armor, and the first creature, which used to have a tentacle, sprawls like rotten sugar powder, having lost its head. The second one, trying to get in the back, scratches the stiletto out of its eye, along with its eyes - Maisa had brewed the poison for that knife, too, swearing that even a ghost or a dead man would be badly hurt by it.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 10:26

"No lie, wretch." Cauldron tiredly but contentedly summarized, intercepting another throwing needle from the rampaging Poisoner and Assassin with the fabric of his sleeve. "It really worked."

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 10:30

Somewhere nearby, but just as surely and infinitely far away, his older and now only brother yells his commands, deflecting a new dose of dope, but the middle brother only sighs sorrowfully. The boons that had been placed on all of them before they went on the attack, protecting them from the lion's share of the brainwashing, would soon be exhausted, and there wouldn't be enough personal amulets to cover the entire crowd. Although, why should he? There wouldn't be any crowd by then anyway!

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 10:32

Blowing off the head of the devil, Cauldron tried to cover his side from another poisonous iron, but the gift was late, though he was ready to swear that the creature that had subdued the girl had sicced it on all three brothers. Devils like to play such jokes, like friends killing friends and lovers killing lovers. However, unlike the youngest, he couldn't stand that bitch all his life, and deep down, he was even glad that now he could finally slaughter her.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 10:34

"Cauldrons!" Yelled someone from the last set, either Chik or Brick, he couldn't immediately remember. "Cauldrons, I've caught Olive!"
STALKER

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 10:28

This is about the tone of voice one uses when one has "caught" a ravenous desert camel, which one now wants to take somewhere because the animal does not want to go free. A little turn of the body, giving way to some big man with an expensive-looking flamberge in his hands, and then Cauldron sees that Brick (it is him. He has an earring in his ear) has really caught Maisa, taking her in his grasp. But she doesn't even break free, only presses her form into the fighter who embraced her, and the latter's amulets of stable mind are fuming.

Camrad_RIP 22.09.23 в 10:39