15. Scheme for Freedom

Portaling back into my chamber I felt the last strands of flesh in my chest regenerate and my smile disappear, not wasting any time I sat on my meditation cushion and breathed deeply as I closed my eyes.

'Calm down Hoopa…', I thought my emotions were running wild yet perfectly contained and my face the perfect image of serenity.

Oh, I wanted to vent but that would be a great waste of time and in the end, it's only a temporary solution. Not forgetting the collateral damage I will cause that would fuck up the Milky Way in ways I wasn't certain would even heal, creating a scar from the Immaterium to the Materium was not hard. Not hard for me, that is.

Anyway… The lizard bitch calling me to show how good of a pet I'm to her click of psychotic saurians had been sudden and had interrupted me in my studies, studies that were in many things but the focus lately had been on the terrifying and versatile art of the mind known as telepathy.

From linking minds to communicate light years away instantaneously to sharing of memory to something that no other words could describe other than mind rape and beyond, it was a tool capable of bringing the most horrific and incredible of results.

A tool that held no direct sway on the physical and no sway at all on which didn't have a soul or at the very least a connection to the Sea of Souls.

It was art I was naturally very inclined to and also immune in all forms with the only exception being my connection to Chtylla and how I could be controlled but that was inherent to my design and didn't directly manipulate my mind per se. If that were the case I would be having those oh-so-very heinous and traitorous ideas toward my benevolent creator and her kind.

The latter was something not even the Old Ones could force themselves within, and order would not work well they could still make me say it but they wouldn't be able to enter. And even if I grant them entry it would be similar to their reaction to my heart but far more deadly as it would lead to an explosive reaction so to say, like pure sodium in distilled water.

Or more accurately matter to antimatter but in their central nervous system, this was beside the point that my mind was far stronger in every conceivable way. I was made to be a weapon and they weren't, in addition, the vast majority were not warriors, instead, they were mad scientists playing God.

The control over my person was both straightforward and extensively insidious, the first active and the second passive even if both were intricately woven together.

The first was that I would have to follow the order no matter what, but the fewer constraints were placed and the less explicit the orders were the more options I would be given to execute them. What mattered was the destination and not the journey.

The second connects to the first in a way that made it for me as a baseline. I couldn't harm, maim, or cause discomfort to the Old Ones, but it wasn't operating on magic without logic as ironic as it is. It worked through intent, my intent to directly cause these things to them, it was using myself against myself. My knowledge, my emotions, and my mind itself were being used as tools to stop myself.

If I know something will harm them, then I will not be able to use it on them. Simple yet incredible, as much as I hate the lizard bitch I marveled every day at her works. It was a marvel but it wasn't perfect, mayhaps if I were to create me she could have gone deeper than she could have but she couldn't have and so the result wasn't faultless. To my great joy may I add.

And so there came telepathy, it was myself working against myself but what if I modified myself to trick myself to then trick the compelling effect? It was complicated and delicate but it was in the realm of the possible if only for a brief time before my mind felt it and forced everything back in order.

I was suffering from my inherent greatness, in addition, my mind being altered even by my own design will likely be noticed and force me to stop what I had started.

This means I had one chance for a sliver of a microsecond at best, not forgetting that any of the Great Old Ones could forbid me from ever doing it again and that would be it. But this wasn't a fatality and there were several countermeasures for this to be used in a way that would kill them all under the right conditions.

This aside it won't be me who would do the killing, as much as it displeases me, this would be something that the Old Ones had met in the distant past and nearly caused their extinction if Orikan words were to be true, and luckily for him they were. Only I know what I would have done to him if he dared to lie or betray me.

What nearly caused this extinction happened millions of years ago and the one culprits of it were, to my pleasant surprise and shock, still alive if in complete stasis, prisoner for eternity in an indestructible cage grown in the most turbulent layer of the Sea of Souls.

A creation of the Old Ones by all parameters, and one of their greatest rivaling and surpassing many aspects of their kind capital. It should be noted that I didn't approach, let alone try to interact with this prison, but I was aware of what it contained and that was enough.

After all, a cell no matter how good it may be became absolutely obsolete if everything that made it what it was could be ignored, it wasn't made with a creature like me in mind not that there was a lot that could be done anyway. However that evidently wouldn't be close enough to free myself of the toads' commands, but I had more planned yet one misstep on my part and all would collapse like a card castle in a windstorm.

Not forgetting telepathy would prove vital in collecting and using the little remaining of what I once was into something useful. A lot was completely lost, but not all, even if that is a endeavor pointless its worth trying.

A few months' worth of time passed like this with me studying and psychic dummies mimicking living souls, helping in the far reach of the galaxy and the like until everything was suddenly interrupted by the loud sound of knocking against my door, even without using my more acute senses with how the knocks sounded like wood being hit let me draw the obvious conclusion to who it was.

"The Clown…", I said, smirking ever so slightly as I plopped myself off my cushion and drifted toward the gate, several more loud knocks echoed as I advanced each louder than the last.

Twitching a finger the massive door snapped open leaving me wide open to an attack in the form of a kaleidoscope of party strings the volume of ocean and with the power to shatter mountains. Invoking a portal I teleported the attack back to its sender, whose boneless body morphed away causing the multicolored strings to come back at me in addition to another volley coming my way.

This little game continued until both of us had been mostly covered in this glittering stringy substance and a chuckle escaped us both, one capable of driving weaker life forms beyond the limit of sanity but a 'simple' chuckle all the same. It helped change my mind if only for the briefest of moments and it was greatly appreciated. For that I was grateful.

"Thank you Cegorach, this was a nice change of pace.", I said honestly, snapping my finger thereby banishing the mess that was done to me and the runes matrix of the chamber will take care of the rest.

"You're welcome my dear many-armed friend, and the sentiment is shared. In this little family of ours, there isn't anyone with any kind of humor or any desire for entertainment at least the kind that I'm in the spectrum of. Isha and Lileath were the only ones before you and they are… How to say without being grossly offensive, one is just mostly amusing me out of sheer kindness and the other is a bit of a prude at times.", the Laughing God babbled mirthfully, his smaller and lighter body solidifying before me then his neck grew in size for him to not have to crane it obscenely so he obscenely lengthened his neck.

Why, I wasn't sure considering he could just hover but truly why not when he was a natural polymorph? Both options were valid and he tended to pick the most ridiculous. If he wants to be the portrait of the lovechild between a giraffe and this eldritch clown obsessed with red balloons and children, who am I to judge him?

"On a more serious note, what is the purpose of this impromptu but appreciated visit?", I asked in curiosity his body immediately stopped moving as if it had frozen, and then like a eureka moment he melted like a puddle in a way a cartoon character does before nodding dramatically to himself.

"The brazing bird had organized a meeting between the strongest of us in the Thrones Room but instead of one of our faithful subjects coming to inform you I graciously decided to take it upon myself to do it instead! Aren't I great? And oh if I may ask out of curiosity, why were you called by Mother on her kind little dustball of a world?", he said, his tone switching from obnoxiously cheery to somewhat serious, something that was to be remarked and it wasn't the one used for jokes.

He knew something was going on, that at the very least I was working in the back of all for my interest. It was evident but I'm quite certain aside from Morai-Heg and him others had any idea of the nature of what I desired

However I didn't react much to that, compared to my other brethren he wasn't a fan of the Old Ones and neither was he happy that our little Pantheon was slaves to them, logic went directly against what he embodied beyond being a glorified meatshield. He wasn't the only one feeling this way but overall it was far more muted in all others, if it was by force or choice that I couldn't tell with certainty.

"Would you prefer words or a condensed memoir of the event?", I asked as we began to move toward the First Layer where the meeting was going to take place.

Using my rings was an option, even using the Celestian Enclave teleportation array but why use them for such a purpose and cut short my time with one of the singular creatures with whom I had a relationship in the realm of friendship?

There was Khaine too but I wouldn't call it friendship, it would be more mutual respect than anything else, and Isha as well but 'friend' wouldn't be the term I would use too… She oozed kindness to an unhealthy level and was trying to please everyone in the domain of reasonable, she was a very good acquaintance but I wouldn't go farther than that. I think the true difference is that Cegorach understands me far more than any other.

"I choose the third option evidently, why take one when I can take both!", and the clown in question said as if it was evident and I granted half of the wish immediately by taking a wisp of the memories, editing them in ways I deemed necessary while still showing the truth.

He didn't hesitate one second and chomped down the flicker of memories. His body worthy in movement, the most hyperactive child reached a standstill, and the ever-present grin on his porcelain drama mask face cracked and became a snarl, all happened in microseconds before he was back to his usual self but something was different.

He was angry, genuinely angry about it all, something that was nice in a strange way to know, and it seemed to only rise as I began explaining with words what he saw and even experienced to a lesser degree. Memories were far more than mere images and sounds.

"-But don't think about it too much, there is nothing to be done that won't transpire. Keep going as you would Cegorach.", I finished rather cryptically, a hint of a smile with bloodlust appearing and vanishing from my face as fast as it came. It's not that I didn't trust him to help me, quite the opposite is that he wouldn't be able to help me and it would backfire screwing us both over.

But it wasn't his fault, it was how he had been designed.

If I could be considered a slave then he, something handcrafted from the ground up with far less restriction around to be modeled would be far more enslaved, he was less than an automaton in many ways here. His very nature made it so he was even entertaining these thoughts close to mine.

It was sad, there were no other words for it. This entire war we were all in was tragic and pointless but there weren't a thousand solutions to put an end to it.

"Ah finally, finally! We have reached our destination!", Cegorach suddenly exclaimed excitedly and teleported within in a flash of glittering rose petals and I followed suit but in a deep purple vortex. My rings gave me the ability to warp everywhere but I could evidently still teleport the regular way.

I reappeared and invoked my seat, a levitating throne befitting for my size made of pure gold, carving of various mystical meanings adorned it while hundreds of cut gemstones from onyx to amethyst each of their facets full of my personal brands of runes.

Shifting my tail to the nook specifically made for this I hovered down and seated myself on the vibrant red velvet cushion of the chair. Three of my arms flew off their shock, one moving below my chin and begin fiddling innocently with my beard while the two others grasped the gilded armrest, the black claws scrapping audibly like metal against metal.

"At the last the two of our final numbers arrive, you are a fourteenth of a quarter cycle late.", a cold metallic baritone voice echoed with little emotion stated from my left, the owner of it a stone grey masculine humanoid creature wearing a toga of gold, Vaul the Forgebound, Aeldari God of Smith, and all Craftsmanship from Architecture to Bonesinging.

He was on a throne smaller than mine and also lower, it's a sign of our state difference, it was silly but that was the rules and I didn't make them. His throne was composed of highly advanced technology yet also of swords and untold weapons from seemingly all stages of civilization. A magnificent ll and quite tacky piece but it lacked the bling and brilliance of mine and that was what mattered.

"Our most sincere apology dear older brother, we might have lost count of time as Hoopa and I argued on which colors were the magnificent banners your disciples weaved.", Cegorach bullshited his way through and knowing that it was, in fact, something we had done, the only bullshit part was the timeline presented.

But it didn't seem to be close to a satisfactory answer as things were going to heat up but all stopped from a throne of vegetation that of bloody thorns, sizzling poison, delicate flowers, and wide leaves Isha said softly.

"Everyone please settle down, let's not start an argument over such a trivial matter. Cegorach has made amend for them, and might I add arguing will not grant the time lost back. Let's not waste what can be used.", her words had an immediate effect calming down our brother of the forge with pure logic, something he couldn't argue against as it was nothing else but the absolute truth.

'Oh that could have been fun...', I thought with disappointment even if I was still grateful overall.

Then the one sitting on the highest and largest throne, one made of living primordial fire brighter than any star stood up, decided to stop being a decoration, and moved, his body made of plated armor moving with extraordinary if pompous elegance as he spoke with regality only possessed by the highest royalty in both ways of speech and sheer arrogance.

"By the incandescent essence of my divine flame, I, Asuryan, Phoenix King, your King declare this war council officially started."

*

My P@treon is up to chap 25 if you are interested.

p@treon.com/user?u=60424165