Chương 136: Confiscated

"You survived?" Ep'Nanorschi's typical self-serving humour was gone from her voice.

"How?" Nyxil blinked. Her gaze tracked the former marketplace that was on the verge of becoming a battlefield. Even when she'd faced down hundreds of thousands on the day of her sacrifice, the gazes had been hungry. These high creeds were ready to tear her apart. As she considered what to say, Nyxil very intentionally did not bite her lip. To great difficulty. Exactly how much did they know? She could assume they were aware of the pyramid's collapse — given the response — but what of the pharaoh?

"Yes," she hedged.

"Was I not supposed to?" Nyxil gave an accusative glare towards the powerful cultist. One that rekindled the aggression held by those around the Bodytwisters.

"No," an older member of the Everseeing Eye cult sneered. He stepped forward, lidless eyes boring into the taller woman.

"Your Adjudicator allowed a Null Scar to be the locale for a Trial without a comprehensive search. At least, that's the most generous view."

"Oh hush. This one survived; clearly it wasn't so dangerous."

"The pyramid collapsed. Even our hidden observers have disappeared." He turned to Nyxil.

"Are there any other survivors inside?"

"No." The cultist clicked his tongue. Whatever hope he'd still had, it was now crushed.

"We are all quite interested in hearing an explanation; no few cults have lost their champion today." A Worshipper interrupted. The arachnoangel besides him gestured to the rift. The Worshipper nodded in deferment.

"But for now, it is best to move away from the Scar. The abomination that destroyed the pyramid is likely still within." Nyxil held her tongue. She couldn't see the revelation of its ceased existence being any help to her. And that was assuming they believed her. Eyes followed her as she was led away from the Null Scar. Some with confused, almost startled looks that immediately dove into thick tomes they carried. Nyxil winced. Onomasticians.

Those that had seen her before the Null Scar Trial probably disbelieved their own memory.

"Tell us what happened." The Everseeing Eye cultist snatched her elbow. His grip was stronger than she'd ever expect from one of those that spent all day looking into the sky. Glancing around, she couldn't find a Technocultist anywhere. Worrying. The other high creed cultists that had gathered to hear her statement didn't offer her any lenience. They, too, needed to know what had happened. Even Ep'Nanorschi.

She stood tall and proud, with the half dozen kinks in her spine all straightened, yet she leaned in as if this wasn't all an effort she and the Bodytwisters had enacted with Lysyra.

"Your champion, Ly͚sy͚rã, tossed the others into a trap."

"As is fair," Ep'Nanorschi interrupted.

"These are the Harbinger Trials."

"…said trap proceeded to awaken and kill every champion in moments," Nyxil continued.

"Then destroyed the pyramid."

"Yes, fair." The Everseeing cultist sneered and Ep'Nanorschi found herself the focus of ire again.

"Fair is informing only your champion of the danger. Fair is cutting down an entire generation of harbingers to keep your twisted fingers on the right to host." Ep'Nanorschi scoffed. The stitches holding the sides of her lip and nose together snapped.

"I was not aware of any danger greater than the embalmed. Besides, we still have the kids who wimped out before the pyramid came down. Ly͚sy͚rã hasn't won it for us yet; there are three now for the final Trial."

"You take us for fools? Even if it was gross negligence that lead to this disaster, you and your cult will face consequences." Ep'Nanorschi twisted her head slightly. Her expression didn't change, but Nyxil got the sense that she was glaring at someone amongst the battle-ready Bodytwisters.

"I am not aware of any foul play. This was nothing more than a freak accident, and your observers are just as liable as ours for failing to notice." The Everseeing Eye cultist scoffed, but before he could exclaim his disagreement, the Worshipper's arachnoangel stepped in. Not a moment behind, the Worshipper stepped between the two before their agitation could reach an all out war between cults.

"Not the time," he snapped, yet his gaze was on Nyxil alone.

"You have yet to answer the question. How did you survive? What exactly is this awakened trap that we are to face?" Nyxil internally cringed. She'd take a war over having to explain how she alone survived. No, that wasn't fair; she'd take a war between the Bodytwisters and Worshippers without strings attached. Let them cut each other down. Glancing between the small crowd of high creed cultists each lending an ear to her, she realised she'd have no better opportunity.

Nyxil could only hope the damage had been done by the time her lies came back to bite her.

"Honestly?" She made her glance into the crowd obvious.

"Ly͚sy͚rã warned me. Gave me just enough information to avoid the same fate as everyone else… how to avoid the ancient being as it tore apart the pyramid." Nyxil's goal was twofold: make it obvious the Bodytwisters knew about the being — whether they actually knew or not — and put Ly͚sy͚rã in trouble with her own cult. It worked wonders. Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author's preferred platform and support their work!

The space around her dimmed and the sinister glow of rituals shone through fluttering black robes. A harmonic chant hung over shouts of outrage, and the vicious growls of bound beasts. Ep'Nanorschi stepped back, her eyes narrowed. But it wasn't the crowd of aggressors she glared. Once again, her gaze pierced her own cult. Her distraction lasted only a moment. A second Worshipper strode past the first.

The moment Ep'Nanorschi noticed his approach, the rest of her stitches snapped and she growled at him with a jaw full of ringed worm-like teeth. The small arachnoangel that followed him shifted. Its legs rotated outward to take each step, then folded underneath, clicking in place and twisting a gear. Each rotation, its metal body enlarged. Its spindly legs grew longer. In moments, the arachnoangel knocked aside the first Worshipper with the bulk of a trolley.

Nyxil first thought the Worshipper was covered in piercings. They ringed his eyes, ran down his nose, sprung through his neck, but it wasn't until she looked close that she noticed each were moving. Thousands of tiny, fingernail-sized machines scuttled across and through his skin like ants in a nest. No. More like maggots through a corpse. The Worshipper from before was now prostrating himself before them. Not at the new cultist, but the massive mechanical spider that now stood well over their heads.

Even his arachnoangel seemed to peer up at its larger variant with awe and deferment despite its blank eyes. Ep'Nanorschi — the reason Nyxil was always so hesitant to observe the names of the powerful — was standing right besides her, yet she couldn't help herself. Her gaze touched the worshipper's name. Eighth… maybe ninth evolution. He was roughly as strong as Ep'Nanorschi, but Nyxil couldn't help but notice something incredibly strange about his name. It was clean. There was not a single curse to mar his soul.

Either he'd had one of the most selfless and honourable lives of anyone she'd ever met — something Nyxil didn't believe for a second — or he went to great lengths to cleanse himself of all curses. Even the mostly unobtrusive ones. His spider was, of course, somewhere above thirteen evolutions. And she'd almost not even bothered checking. Both arachnoangel and Worshipper turned to her in eerie unison. Nyxil stepped back, but not before Ep'Nanorschi snarled at the Worshipper.

"Shelo'S͐u'S͐en̲ͧa̦̅l̥̊os" Her voice was guttural and vile, yet surprisingly legible through the inhuman jaw.

"You are not meant to be here. You were under oath." Ninth evolution then. Shelo'Su'Senalos did not turn from Nyxil as he addressed Ep'Nanorschi.

"I do as my gods wish. Nothing more." Said 'god' snapped its eyes away from Nyxil and strode towards the Bodytwister. A wave of vicious intent shunted up behind the machine, as if each cultist waited for it to signal the beginning of war. They were ravenous. Many cultists were cowards by nature, but there was much to be gained by felling one's opponents. Of that, Nyxil was intimately familiar. There was just as much excitement in the air, as there was indignation at their lost champions.

Only the higher creeds — who understood what the Trials was a competition for — were truly enraged at the loss of their promising children. To her credit, Ep'Nanorschi stared up at the machine without backing down. Both stood above the rest.

"So this is your choice?" Her face was still a worm's, yet Nyxil could hear the humour in her tone. If she had lips, she would be smirking "Well be my guest. You can take the initiation curse, and I'll get to tear apart some junk metal." The look in Shelo'Su'Senalos eyes was venomous. Each metal maggot went hysterical. Even a few lifted his eyelids as they crawled out, pus and blood following. Nyxil turned away.

"What of the being?" Nyxil's eyes snapped back to the Worshipper. His words were sharp, and the barely suppressed fury was obvious to all.

"Does it remain?"

"No." Nyxil stifled her throat's temptation to waver before it could reflect in her voice. She'd just faced down an ancient ruler that far outranked her. One angry cultist wasn't about to faze her.

"After destroying the pyramid, its body ate itself." Shelo'Su'Senalos narrowed his eyes at her, and Nyxil had a moment of internal panic that her story had been too convenient. But the cultist snapped his head away with the next motion.

"Go. Search the Null Scar." He waved for his own cult to enter the sole remaining rift. The other high creed rose from his prostration to dive into the sun scarred land without hesitation.

"This," he snatched the sceptre from Nyxil's hand.

"And anything else we find is our property."

"Hey!"

"The Null Scar is ours!" both Nyxil and Ep'Nanorschi shouted. Shelo'Su'Senalos turned furious eyes on the Bodytwister, ignoring Nyxil completely.

"Ep̽'N̺an̺o͐r̔sc͈hi̫͑, you said you wanted war, did you not? If you are so sure you will be unanimously considered in the right, then feel free to strike. The treaty curse will have no hold on you." His arms spread wide, and Nyxil tried not to stare at the dozen metal worms that burst from the flesh of his arms. Each much larger than the maggots. Ep'Nanorschi didn't move.

"The Machine God Worshippers shall appropriate authority of the Trials for what little remains to assure there is no further meddling."

"That is overstepping, Shelo'S͐u'S͐en̲ͧa̦̅l̥̊os." His name hardly left her mouth before he snapped back at her.

"You killed our Champion! We have no skin in this game, yet your cult remains in question. Be grateful I have left you the privileges of a host for whatever remaining time you keep them." Ep'Nanorschi's face stitched back together. She still looked frustrated, yet she was clearly winding back from igniting the battle. While the rest of the crowd urged them on, the high creeds ignored their juniors as if they were the cries of infants.

Nyxil had come so close to setting them against each other, now things had shifted the other way. She glanced around for Tarchon or any Technocultist at all. If they took charge of the Trial, she would have counted that as a win, but they weren't anywhere to be seen. She dove for her sceptre. Shelo'Su'Senalos simply lifted it out of her grasp, as one would a child. Too fast for even her name enhanced reflexes.

"Be appeased with the names you have achieved." The Worshipper sneered down at her." This belongs where it can be put to good use." Once again, Nyxil's sceptre was taken from her. Worshippers soon returned from the Scar to confirm the lack of threat. As soon as they did, Ep'Nanorschi spat Shelo'Su'Senalos's way and her spine snapped many times, bringing her back down into her usual hunch as she stormed off. The high tensions gradually made way for an air of disappointment.

As the high creed Worshipper said, Nyxil should be happy with what she achieved today. But right now?

She felt nothing but frustration. The giddiness of having taken down something so much stronger than herself was wiped away with her failure. She wasn't sure the exact details of the treaty that made them wary to be the ones to start a war, but she was sure just a little more push was all she needed to have them carve away at each other's numbers. Well… it was mostly the sceptre that had her gritting her teeth. If tensions were already this high, she would have another chance to push them to war… somehow.

But to have what she worked for taken away from her so easily? It had her seething. Nyxil struggled hard against a feral instinct to shred through the Worshipper's throat. She wanted to sink teeth into blood and twist like an animal. Such a desire no longer felt alien.

"Five days," Shelo'Su'Senalos said.

"There are only three of you, so the final Trial will be quick." Nyxil's teeth had grown too sharp. Just sucking in her cheeks was enough to taste blood. How annoying.

"Will you need a guide to the Grand Sacrificial Chamber?" He hooked the sceptre over his shoulder even as he asked, making sure she knew it wasn't coming back to her hands. Why did it have to be there?

"I know the way." Nyxil watched the subtle darkness that lingered in a massive sphere around the sceptre as she strode away from the site of disaster. It was barely noticeable compared to earlier, but the shrouding effect remained. That sceptre was hers. Nyxil would take it back no matter where the Worshippers hid it.