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154 - The Death of the Lost Sun Killer [Cherno]
🕑 Added 2023-11-01 02:07:53 +0000 UTCA/N: Changed the design of Sorayah's voidkey to a more appropriate one for its origins and narrative purpose.
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"You're mad,” said a wide-eyed Sorayah in a hushed tone. “So what, you mean to just keep killing until the world is 'rid of evil'?!"
"Come now," Krahe sneered. "The world is much too large for one woman to personally fry every shitbag businessman into his office chair. A gardener never runs out of weeds to pluck. I only need to make sure I never get the wrong man! Easy enough."
At this point, Krahe was just messing with Sorayah, purposely using extreme rhetoric while remaining quasi-accurate to her real beliefs. Alas, nuance didn't make for a good monologue.
"What of the churches, then?! You don't mean to claim-"
"What makes you think I won't come after a corrupt priest? By rights, I ought to root out corruption within the church with absolute prejudice. It would be a disservice to the divine not to do so. It's almost time now - there won't be much left of you after this, just a shadow on the wall. I'm sure the higher-ups would prefer if I just pulled out your voidkey and had you taken in for questioning, but I did promise to show you real anathemism..."
"No, wait- wait wait wait, please! I don't need to see it, and my key, it's-"
Sorayah desperately thrashed against her restraints. Krahe genuinely didn't understand why she hadn't tried to fight back or free herself; surely, she wasn't so reliant on that lantern device as to be incapable of normal thaumaturgy. Or perhaps she was smart, and rightly thought that fighting back would only serve to worsen her situation.
"-it's here. Take it, just don't kill me," she said, twisting her head. A sigil on her neck began to glow - it was a triangle with small circles at its corners, each circle containing an eldritch sigil. They were some of the same sigils as those which filled the ritual circle. Sorayah gritted her teeth, hissing, and a hexagonal rod bearing that triangular mark slowly emerged from her scales. It was an extraordinarily simple design in physical shape, this simplicity offset by the fact its body was covered with countless more angular patterns with sigils in circles at the angles. Krahe's mind immediately jumped to circuitry.
It looked to be a stony, reddish material at first, only to seamlessly transition to the anthracite-like, glowing material one-third of the way down its length.
"The church will reward you more for bringing me in alive, you should know that."
Krahe manifested a tar tendril, using it to reach over and begin pulling on the key. Though it took quite a bit of effort, it came out without incident. It was around 20cm in length, with its lower 2/3 made from that anthracite-like matter. She didn't bother to appraise it yet, slipping it into her pocket, because her attention was solely on Sorayah. The saurian looked disappointed and frustrated; despite trying to hide it, Krahe noticed the shift in her demeanor and the rumbling in her throat. For this reason, Krahe kept her hand in her pocket, fusion-forming a smoke burster packed with as much isotope as she could fit. Out of sight and beyond her notice, concealed by clothing, reams of eldritch symbology pulsed across Sorayah's back, eidolons swimming beneath her skin like predatory fish waiting leap out of the water.
"Disappointed that I didn't come up right next to you so you could set off a contingency or something of the sort? Come on," Krahe scoffed. "What kind of fool did you take me for? Every member of the Society is a theurge, and you were a high-ranking one. Of course you would have contingencies."
Raising her left hand just above her head, she willed Barzai to collapse into the Daemon Core. Despite the lack of need for an incantation, Krahe nonetheless recited one, to see if Sorayah would try to interrupt it.
"Lei-Amul, Thelder, Wandrei, great sages of the Astral Gulf, hold fast the Three Keys and uncoil the chains that bind-"
As expected, Sorayah's pupils became hair-thin lines and she emitted a shrill, ear-splitting screech. Her entire body was enveloped in pulsating strings of runes, and, on reflex, Krahe decided to dive while she finished casting. She had seen these runes displayed earlier during their confrontation at the Society, but this time, they were far denser and brighter, and they leapt off of Sorayah's skin, lashing her surroundings.
The saurian freed herself and carved deep gashes into everything around her in an instant; the human charcoal fell apart into pieces. Krahe honestly wasn't sure why she hadn't done this sooner, but the reason revealed itself when she got a look at Sorayah and saw that she hadn't been entirely spared, either. There were deep gashes covering her whole body, all the way into meat. Moreover, she seemed to have become feral, based on her hunched stance, bestially heavy breathing, and glazed-over eyes.
"Where..." Sorayah growled, looking around. Her eyes locked onto Krahe, and she lunged, leaping across the room. With that leap, yet more reams of script exploded out of her, shredding the ceiling and floor, but passing through Krahe unimpeded. Being able to see it up-close and while partly submerged in the Gulf, Krahe got a first-row seat to serpent-like creatures covered in those runes tearing their way out of their master's body before transforming fully into their theurgic forms.
It was done.
Krahe emerged from her dive, raising her hand.
Sorayah leapt right at her without a moment wasted, but by the time she or her absurdly lethal, self-destructive theurgy could reach Krahe, she had already burned both her skim charges to get out of the way.
Desperation - and with it, sapience - flashed over Sorayah's contorted features. With a swing of her arm, arabesque runes flashed down its length. A deep gash along the same spiral appeared on the limb as the runes tore themselves free, lashing towards the Daemon Core rather than Krahe herself. A last-ditch effort to try and shoot down the theurgic vessel before it could carry out its function.
It was too late.
The spear of eldritch script did pierce the shell, but all it achieved was to hasten Sorayah's demise.
A narrow flashlight of red light shot out, accompanied by a thunderous buzzing sound. It obliterated both Sorayah's theurgy and her arm, and before she could even scream in pain, it expanded to consume her entirely.
Then, just as quickly as it had begun, the deluge was over, and a disjointed shadow had been burned into the reinforced metal that covered the ritual chamber's interior.
