The black marble under my feet began to twist and shape as my will was exerted upon it. The stone resisted me; it didn’t resist being changed but it had its own ideas about what it wanted to be. My mind recoiled as I touched upon the slumbering entity. It was not a creature of the void per se, but rather a singular thought so real, it had become physical. Or it was something that had been real but had been reduced to one singular clear thought.
Ethereal continued to drain out me like a waterfall even without an ancient nearby. The stone drank it in like a sponge, becoming more and more real. The mountain surface flattened under my feet as black glass with swirling whirls of silver-white running through it took shape.
Guinevere took my hand as the stone altered and changed around us.
The void angels took to the air, spiraling and swooping through the void above us. They suddenly began to sing, all at once in a single united chorus. There were no words, and the sound was alien and otherworldly, something no human’s throat could ever create. The sound rose up and reverberated through the air. If my soul was a burning star in this void, then the chorus was a bell announcing our presence as it tolled again and again.
There was suddenly a presence, I could feel something approaching me; no, not just one creature, at least two approaching us. I couldn’t see them; it was more a sense of dread as something vast and unknowable came closer and closer. I couldn’t tell how long I had, but it was hours rather than days.
I renewed my concentration on World Forge, pouring more ethereal into its creation. Tiny sprouts appeared across the stone as the saplings for the Sacrificial Forest took root. I wouldn’t be able to use these immediately, but once I found a way to leave the Void, I could raise my attributes higher and higher faster than my enemies could rank up. My focus was totally devoted to the construction of the fortress, flattening spaces and levels for battle and creating tunnels and chambers deep within the rock. Walls started to rise up around us as I began work on outbuildings and…
“Mordred!” Guinevere gasped, her voice filled with sudden panic, her hand tightening to where it would have snapped bone on most people even at my rank.
I turned to her in concern. “What is it?”
“My water just broke,” she said, leaning against the wall and sliding down to the ground.
My body went tense. We weren’t ready, we were still in the Void and I had ancients headed for our very position. I tried to relax but I felt panic and fear like I had never known.
“What do you need from me?” I asked.
“I’m not sure,” Guinevere said, breathing in and out heavily. “I don’t know what’s going to happen here.”
The chorus of the void angels rose in intensity and pitch. The mountain reverberated and sang back in response like a glass harp someone had brushed a finger across.
“You need to make this place more real,” Voidra said. “You need to impose your concept of reality fully here.”
“How do I do that?” I asked. “Just push out more ethereal?”
“You’ll likely need to upgrade Void Asura again,” Voidra said. “We have to hope its next effect will help you stabilize this realm more.”
“Guinevere’s giving birth now!” I shouted. “We don’t have time….”
“I can hold on….” Guinevere said, her skin drenched in sweat and her dress soaked from the waist down. “Do what you have to do.”
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“Don’t run out to meet them,” Ares said. “You could barely handle one of them. Finish your preparations here and meet them on your own terms.”
I gritted my teeth in frustration; my terms were quickly becoming unfavorable. I pushed aside the fear and uncertainty. I had to be unbreakable for my daughter, so that is what I would be. The mountain continued to twist and change, not from any conscious decision on my part but as it took on the form it desired to be. A colossal ziggurat with buildings and roads on every tier began to take shape.
The section of the mountain that had broken off in my fight against Illumin still hung there, motionless and unchanged. I stretched out my hand and a bridge of stone rose up and connected the two.The silver and white marble streaks began spreading through it as its jagged shape began to flatten out at the top. Pillars began to rise from the ground and roots began to curl around them as they extended up and up.
A temple in the style of the Parthenon began to fully form, while it might have resembled Greek architecture, it dwarfed all but the largest modern buildings on earth. The roots of the silver and white trees spiraled up the pillars and across every building. The branches of the trees continued to open and spread wide, their leaves brilliant to behold but somehow produced no light in their surroundings.
I had less of a fortress and more of a mountainous city. It looked both brand new and like an overgrown ruin with the branches of the trees spreading over nearly every surface and their roots twisting into every bit of the architecture. The city was beautiful, almost too beautiful to the point where you couldn’t imagine people actually living in it.
“They are getting closer,” Voidra said.
Every void entity I had killed besides the ancients had dropped a crystal, a living thought killed and made physical. I took them out and began to warp them with World Forge. Mab floated at my side as I inscribed the same enchantment I had used to create Clarent on them and fitted them into a hilt. They wouldn’t be as powerful as Clarent was but I activated one, looking at the flat blade of energy that emerged. It was made of dark silver light with marbling of white and pure silver throughout that slowly shifted and twisted, like kelp underwater. These would be the weapons for my army; weapons made from condensed thought to be wielded by beings of pure spirit.
The presence of the ancients began to weigh on me like a physical burden. I looked out over the horizon, watching as two shapess moved within the darkness. As my soul grew more powerful, I was becoming more aware of my surroundings. I could feel the two ancients’ presence; not just theirs, but Guinevere’s and that of every Void Angel. Beyond them, I could sense lost souls, other creatures, and even more ancients all moving towards me.
The Void Angels began to all fly together in a clockwise spiral around the mountain, and I stood at the center of the vortex. I picked up Guinevere and carried her up the bridge to the temple. I laid down a bed of furs and blankets. Her hand squeezed mine but her eyes were shut tight with pain and concentration as she fought to hold back her contractions.
“I won’t fail you,” I promised her.
The angelic chorus rose up higher and higher, reverberating all around us. I stepped out of the temple as the ancients came fully into view when they stepped onto the plateau at the base of the mountain. Their vast frames began to shrink and reduce as they were forced to enter my semi-real domain. Clarent sparked to life in my hand and I activated Void Asura. The void angels singing reached one last fevered chorus then fell silent and they swooped down, landing all around me.
I lifted my hand using Telekinesis to raise up the sword hilts I had created for each of them. The void angels took the weapons and extended the blades, their tall, otherworldly frames noble and majestic with their swords in hand.
“I fought by some of you, killed some of you or had you killed,” I said. “But I don’t know if I am the same man I was then. I am not the Warlord of Kelesa anymore; I am not a champion of any god. But today, I will be your champion, I will be your warlord. Today, I fight for you, for my wife, and for my daughter. In the past I would have dominated you and made you fight by my side; today I ask you to fight beside me. I shall lay down my life to protect your souls before I let you be devoured again, and I shall sacrifice all the blood I have to bring my daughter into the world.”
Their answer was not of words, but of a resonating thrum that passed through the mountain. Every angel took to the air and swooped down towards the ancients as the two of them reached the base of the ziggurat and touched its surface. I lifted up into the air and dived down after them, scarlet lighting wreathing my body as a roar broke from my throat to join the resonating thrum of the angels.