Chương 134: Tomb

Nyxil's song rang out across the lifeless dunes, joined by the echo of her tongue. She hated using the Fleshsmith's ritual. Unfortunately, it was the only one that had a chance of making use of the sacrifice she had before her. As the indistinct lyrics rolled along her tongue and left her lips, they changed. Instead of going by memory, she altered the tone and pronunciation into a rhythm that just felt better. In some instances, she replaced the words entirely.

Nyxil wasn't sure why, but as the song travelled from her brain to her mouth, parts twinged at her. They seemed wrong. Imprecise. She had no choice but to fix it as she chanted. It was as if the ritual hymn was a language she'd long forgotten. The pentagram was as much a part of that language, yet it was not as easily altered. Especially now, when she didn't have a clean surface to work with.

Nyxil didn't bleed anywhere near near as much as Sekhhath'Ra with his curses, but she'd taken enough injuries in this fight that she might as well be a fountain herself. She wasn't concerned; her body had long since proved its resilience to blood-loss. Fortunately, that blood was a perfect medium for ritual circles. As the Eternal Pharaoh struggled to hold against the tirade of cursed blood and rock, Nyxil painted the land. She flew low over sands, spilling blood as she drew the patterns as she remembered them.

To avoid the sickly yellow-crimson fluid desperate to chew through the rest of Sekhhath'Ra's life, her pentagram needed to be upscaled. Kilometres she flew, spilling buckets of blood. Sometimes, the lines weren't clean. Her speed left gaps between droplets where they seeped into the sands. There was little Nyxil could do about it, besides cutting herself open any more than she already was. She had to rely on her blood's quality as a ritual medium to bridge those inefficiencies.

If she had more time, she would have done it properly. But Sekhhath'Ra didn't have time. The being had lived so long, yet it was clear to both her, and the pharaoh himself, that his end was rapidly approaching. He still desperately fought his curses, but he no longer moved freely. Each metre was a mountain. Rock shifted on its own, crashing down on him one after the other. The insectoid blood was worse.

Carrying the ill-will of an omnicided world, it did everything it could to smother and infect any part of his body it could. Black stone lurched towards her, thrown by an explosion at the heart of the collapsed pyramid. Nyxil dodged, but her focus remained on the source. If Sekhhath'Ra still had the strength to toss a mountain off his back, then it was just as likely the fight would continue. Under the bright solar light, his chitin looked as ruined as the tomb around him.

Cracked, flaking and scorched, what parts of his exoskeleton remained were moments away from crumbling to dust. Sekhhath'Ra's eyes had long since left betrayed him, and his antennae had shrivelled, yet Nyxil could feel the frustrated resignation of his gaze. It took a mere second for that acquiescence to morph into indignation. A seething fury overtook him. The Eternal Pharaoh knew she was going to sacrifice him. It was the ultimate insult.

After twenty thousand years spent sacrificing his world, it was fitting, but Sekhhath'Ra couldn't see it that way. She was a child. His legacy was supposed to be eternal, not for some teen many orders of power weaker than himself to exploit. Even if he was to cease, he would not allow the one to finally dethrone him to benefit from his death. The only thing they would inherit, were the curses that continued to weigh him down. It was petty. It was blatantly hypocritical.

But to the creature that felt betrayed by those greater than gods, it was justice. Nyxil was ready for whatever the pharaoh threw at her, but despite the vivid malice directed her way, it no longer had the freedom to strike her. The ocean of blood manifesting extremities of the dead engulfed him again. Stone churned, burying him deeper. Geysers of black rock and alien blood exploded from the pile with a desperate regularity, but Sekhhath'Ra could no longer escape his tomb.

The pentagram, finally taking form, burst to life. It responded to her hymn. Sand soaked with her blood first erupted in crimson flame, before it reacted to the world around it and took on the colour of the sun above. Her voice danced over the dunes. Most of the time, her symphony played in harmony. A chorus all of herself. But every so often, that harmony would diverge; three, four voices sang different lyrics, yet the symphony remained. The alternate lines came as easily as breathing.

A variation on the chant that she simply knew would improve it. Not that she could explain how she knew. Solar flares continued their eternal searing of the planet beyond the horizon, and the sulphuric flames of her ritual rose in silent mimicry. Nyxil's blood, strong a medium as ever, fuelled the ritual to the point that air itself shivered in anticipation. Nyxil's symphony was reaching its climax. Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

The Eternal Pharaoh could feel it too. His attempts at dislodging the curse became more frantic, yet each geyser was weaker. She flew in close. All of this preparation would be for nought if she weren't the one to strike the death blow. Neither claw was in operable condition; as much as they were her favoured weapon, they could not do the job. A tentacle pulled the sceptre free from its place on her back. Warm to the touch, but not painfully hot. The crystallised flare pulsed in response to the sun above.

Now out in the open, it somehow seemed even brighter; a reflection of the ball of flames that filled the sky. Nyxil could feel its yearning to be used. Once again, it infiltrated her mind, but at least now she knew it wasn't entirely lies the staff spouted. It wanted to be used, and so she would use it. … better than her teeth. Nyxil would bite if necessary, but it was probably a good idea not to get in the habit. She flew down low over the crumbled tomb, trying to decide how to go about this.

It was hard to bludgeon someone to death when they were buried, after all. Fortunately, the sceptre called. It demanded she raise its golden regalness, and with her mind sealed off from any mind altering manipulation, Nyxil did. As the miniature solar flare frozen in time rose over her head, a true one ripped from the sky. Heat engulfed her. Fire first burned down through the head of the sceptre and then down on the earth below. Yet she did not burn.

She lingered at the edge of the inferno, fanning the flames, but not becoming immersed. Guided by the motion of her tentacles — Curious, Cuddly and Shy all sharing the burden — the solar flare burned through the wreckage. Black stone that had withstood the sun's onslaught for thousands of years now vaporised beneath the plasma wind. Without the blood of infinite dead, the slabs lacked their former resilience. Nyxil worked her way down quickly.

Even if she hadn't known where the pharaoh was, the flares took on a mind of their own and drilled after him. Soon, a mass of stone had been carved away, revealing Sekhhath'Ra once more. He was, unsurprisingly, not pleased to see her. He raised the remains of one arm, as if to call his sceptre. A habit. Without the name, the golden staff did not heed his command, and when he realised the icon of his rule was now fully at Nyxil's whim, his expression soured further.

The thrumming inferno rapidly ate away at the remains of his body. As he crumbled, the pool of blood around him backed off. Whether the cursed mass realised that Nyxil was intent on killing its target, or it was simply avoiding being incinerated alone with the rock, the swarm of arms and mandibles shifted from trying to deal the killing blow themselves, to simply stopping him from fleeing.

"You have defied the intended order enough," he clicked. There was no snarl, but Nyxil heard it in his tone regardless.

"I shall not gift you the honour of my death. I am S̥e͔kh̃h̃a̱ͬtͣh'Rͦ̏҉̵͕ả; the Eternal Pharaoh. If my reign is to end, then it will be upon my terms." Brittle as his exoskeleton was, his arms had shattered following Nyxil's bite. What was left, was a very sharp stump of chitin. Sekhhath'Ra shoved that shard through his thorax and into his heart. You've caused me enough problems, the least you can do is let yourself die by my hand. Nyxil fell from the sky.

The flare continued to crumble away parts of his body, but the blaze would not kill him quick. His pierced heart would. She had to get in close. Sekhhath'Ra was going to die, and she was going to lose her lamb. His heart had already ceased to beat, and now he was fading. Nyxil smashed the solar foci down on the insectoid's head, hoping to splatter the chitin and kill him in an instant, but that did nothing besides crack the exoskeleton. He radiated a vicious sense of gloating. Alongside it, a deep loathing.

To his dying breath, he cursed her, promised that she would pay for the downfall wrought upon him. The Eternal Pharaoh would die before Nyxil could throw another swing with her sceptre. He would die to his own hand. At least, that would have happened, had the yellow-crimson sea of cursed blood not filled his chest cavity and manually forced his heart to beat.

"No…" his whispered despair went ignored. Not willing to let the opportunity slip from her fingers, Nyxil reared back with the sceptre, and drove the burning tip into Sekhhath'Ra's now exposed heart. Nyxil sang the crescendo as his heart bubbled away. First, she felt a heavy curse taking place in her name, only to be swallowed by her core name in the next breath. Never given enough time to even settle into a form. Next, the ritual began in full. It felt like she was being engulfed by a sun.

Unbearably hot energy washed through her name in a way physical heat couldn't compare. She was accustomed to the void. Now she was drowning. As the ancient being's soul was broken down and shoved into her own, Nyxil was swallowed by agony. She screamed. Both arms reformed in an instant. She wailed. Pushy rejoined its siblings. Her voice gave out.

Nyxil's body stitched itself back into perfect form, but she could find no relief in that, as her soul was stretched and morphed to accommodate all the energy rushing through it. Her claws grew back stronger. Teeth, sharper. The not yet fully grown sludge evolution expanded until she had a pair of slimy orbs hanging from the ends of her legs; neither even having the decency to take the shape of feet. As clarity returned to her mind, Nyxil watched as her core name swallowed the largest proportion of energy.

Each other name soaked as much of the flood as they could, and yet there was still a lot that seemed to slip by. A fourteenth evolution was truly incomprehensible. And it wasn't just the names she was familiar. As Nyxil skimmed her own name, she found ten new additives that hadn't been there last she looked. Another formed even as she counted the new ones. One that, while different, had a similar enough structure that she could identify it immediately. A Feat. Her third. Whatever happened to them being rare?

Nyxil laughed to herself before leaping back into hymn. She still needed to bring the ritual to its close, after it stalled with her screams. Each of her names was full. Even the new ones. Butchering Sekhhath'Ra's soul had given them each enough of a boost to ignore the requirement of experience. She could evolve every name right now. As Nyxil reached the conclusion of the ritual, and the fires dimmed to nothing, she fell out of the sky. A puddle of blood caught her.

Exhausted, she lay back in the murky filth for a while. She might have gotten lucky with a being that had accumulated more curses than he could survive once they ran wild, but she had killed him. She'd killed someone at the fourteenth evolution. It was possible. For the first time in her life, Nyxil actually believed she could kill the cult leaders. Not now. Maybe not even soon, if they managed their curses properly. But there would come a day where she had the strength to fight, and win.