//------------------------------// // Chapter five - The dark city // Story: Blood of the Phoenix // by Violet_09 //------------------------------// Commorragh Within the Eldar webway, locked within its own pocket of reality there lies a city named Commorragh. This city used to be one of the greatest webway port cities before the fall, spires that are over a million miles high tower over the city, some of them can even defy gravity. Several different cities across different areas of the webway combine with Commorragh to form an incomprehensible cluster, but in reality these city's are thousands lightyears apart, yet in Commorragh it’s possible reach these cities on foot. The streets are filled with poverty, tortured souls from all walks of life, and even violence and murder. But that’s only the tip of the iceberg. If a human wanted to navigate the city all on their own, they would immediately go insane just from the sheer sight of the city before getting tortured by the nearby Drukhari so they can feast upon their soul. Only a Drukhari or Aeldari can comprehend the madness and navigate the streets, but even then they must avoid skirmishes from small rival Kabals fighting over land or solving petty conflicts with violence. The only thing you would ever want if you get captured by these depraved, monstrous fiends is death, for it’s better to die than get dragged into Commorragh. You’ll suffer unspeakable tortures, scream beyond agony for weeks, months and even years until you become a vegetable. Unable to speak the only sound coming from your mouth is unclear slurs, but you are most likely begging for death, but you shall not receive it. Begging for death is extremely absurd in Commorragh, for even if you somehow manage to die you will be resurrected and suffer the same fate over and over again. And until the Drukhari have managed to drain your soul of all life out of you, your flesh will still have some uses, whether you get turned into horrific art displays or even furniture you are sentient throughout the entire process. Death is a commodity that only the very lucky can achieve. And if you have no use for the Kabals the Wyches of the gladiatorial arenas shall have their fun. Trained at peak performance these Drukhari play with their food so to speak, And from all around Commorragh the Dark Eldar come to witness their performance so that they can have a bite of their victims soul. You better hope you don’t end up fighting the Arenas champion Lelith Hesperax, for she will destroy you in an blur of movement. You would be lucky to be tortured by the Kabals or fight in the arena with against the Wych cults, the unlucky ones get sent underground where the Haemonculus covens lie, they mould and twist flesh into abominations that are in abysmal pain and have no choice but to serve their evil master. These Haemonculi are well over twenty thousand years old, their extremely frail and and gaunt appearance only confirms this. They’re so old that they’ve began having strange habits like Collecting eyes of a certain species, making their servants skinless so they can use it for leather clothing or torturing their victims with psychological means rather than physical. They are the masters of torture, hopefully you don’t encounter one in the open, it is a very bad omen for things to come. However these are only some of the horrific atrocities that are committed every single day in the dark city of Commorragh. But for now we shall concentrate on one Archon. His name is Khandhar Fellstrike and he is one of the current Archons of the ‘Kabal of the Black heart’, the largest Kabal in Dark Eldar society. The Kabal is lead by Asdrubael Vect, the current supreme overlord of Commorragh, Khandhar is below him, he may rule a certain portion of the Kabal but he must always follow Vects rule like any other Archon in this Kabal. Khandhar’s armour is made from wraithbone, but it’s older than the newer more streamlined armour that the Craftworlds wear. The armour is black but it has some dark green highlights, his armour is also inscribed with runes and he wears a cape made from human flesh. His face has red tattoos that look deep claw marks going across his eyes. his hair goes across the right side of his face and it’s a deep blood red. His weapons are an old husk blade that’s been handed down to him from a previous Archon and a Splinter pistol that can fire shards of crystals at enemies. Right now this Archon is sitting down on his throne and enjoying himself as he plays with a male human slave, tormenting the poor creature with horrific pain. Khandhar cackles like an insane monster and sings to the human. “Eyes without life, maggot-ridden corpses, mountains of skulls. These are a few of my favourite things.” He grabs the human by the neck and points his bade at his chest. “I have very much enjoyed my time with you mon-keigh, bringing suffering to your kind brings a smile to my face.” “P-please, kill me.” The human begs the monster to end his life. “Death?” The Archon laughs in response and his laughter quickly turns into rage. “Death?!” He tosses the human to the ground. “You dare plead for death after what we’ve been through?! I am appalled mon-keigh!” He then kicks the human in the stomach with his armoured shoes, the human coughs out some blood before Khandhar’s hand picks grabs his neck and picks him up, not realising he’s strangling the human to death. “You the gall to ask for death. You can’t have it, you shall feel true pain for all of eternity!” He yells as he accidently makes the humans neck concave when he squeezed too hard. The human dies suffocating. Even though this man got what he wanted in the end, it will be temporary, the Haemonculi can clone the human as many times as the Archon wishes as long as he pays them with souls. Khandhar sits back on his throne and orders. “Send me another play thing! This one seems to be broken!” Just then two Kabalite warriors come in and drag the corpse away and they bring in another human, the Archon smiles with delight. However his pleasure would soon end as an Incubus storms in the room. Incubi are a mercenary organisation within Drukhari society, they only live to kill, yet they can be hired by anyone as long as they provide the mercenary something to fight and kill. The armour they wear is similar shape and colour to the Kabalite warriors, yet It’s far tougher and lighter, they wear bone coloured helmet with glowing green eyes and four horns on its head. It carries two blades called a Klaivex, it can be combined to form a duel ended blade, they’re both large and powerful. Incubi are the most trusted bodyguards for Archons, they are in a sense aspect warriors that are made to kill other aspect warriors. “Oh, hello Lysmahr.” Khandhar greets as his good mood dissipates. “What do I owe the pleasure?” “Permission to leave your side and join the others.” Lysmahr says to the Archon. “Join the others? Why is something I should know?” He asks with the upmost curiosity. “It’s my true master, he calls for us. Visions of a Phoenix lord have been plaguing him.” “You mean Drazhar? That thing doesn’t even speak.” Khandhar remarks. “How would you know that he needs you?” “He just summons us for the murder to come.” Lysmahr quotes. “What in Khaines name is this nonsense are you babbling on about?” The Archon questions his bodyguard “Haven’t you heard the rumours, a Phoenix rises.” He tells Khandhar. “Drazhar has summoned us to fight for him.” Suprised by this predicament Khandhar smiles menacingly as if he has something planned. “So Phoenix lord is resurrecting and Drazhar wants an army to counter them.” “Exactly, that is why I must go without any further delay.” “Very well, but I must join you.” “Why?” “I figure I might be of assistance to Drazhar, just let me get my affairs in order and we’ll both go to him.” Khandhar offers his kind assistance. He gets of his throne and leaves the room to prepare for his day of success, he believes that he would be with good graces with Vect if his plan goes of without a hitch. Khandhar spent the last two hours sorting out his army. He has brought three squads of Kabalite wariors, two squads of wyches, two squads of reaver jetbikes, hellions, scourges, two ravagers, three venoms; and most importantly a means of transport for all his troops once they exit the webway and into real space. And he convinced all of them with the thrill of battle and new slaves to have their way with. They all march to the large gathering of Incubi, their master Drazhar, master of blades can be seen out in the open. His armour is more ornate in appearance, two gold shoulder pads and knee pads, a bone coloured helmet with six horns, a broken spirit stone on the forehead of the helm and a large red pony tail on the back of it. He carries several cracked spirit stones around his neck and he wields his Executioner's demiklaives which he shall soak with the blood of the Phoenix. He’s meditating in the middle of the streets only so that he can prepare his consciousness for his one on one battle with the Phoenix lord, his Incubi brothers and sisters patiently wait for him to finish his meditation. One thing the Khandhar noticed is that this is the largest gathering of Incubi he has ever seen, around two thousand Incubi have come to join Drazhar. Two thousand Incubi, that’s more than what the Archon ever imagined. He walked through the crowd of Incubi along with his body guard, it feels like he disturbed a hornets nest because they’re all staring at him. They look as if they want to brutalize him into a mass of pulsating meat, but if anyone of them dared to make a move on him his bodyguard Lysmahr will protect him, or at least he hopes so. “Drazhar!” Khandhar announces his presence to the master of blades, disturbing his meditation. Drazhar gets up and turns his head towards the Archon slowly, clenching both of his klaives. Khandhar gulps with a sense of fear before he continues. “My humble apologies for disturbing you, but I have come baring gifts, as an offer to your upcoming quest.” Drazhar relaxes slightly. “I have brought to you an army, to break any and all resistance against your will.” Khandhar informs Drazhar. The Incubi leader takes one step closer before the Archon continues speaking once more. “You can have this army on one small condition. You must help me take down a Craftworld, If my theory is correct I believe those pesky Craftworlders shall defend the Phoenix lord, so I want you to help me to destroy it and bring me good graces with Vect for me.” After hearing what the Archon has to say Drazhar has come to a decision, he puts himself into a combat stance and prepares for the Archon to do the same. “What is he doing?” Khandhar asks Lysmahr. “He’s waiting for you to fight him.” Lysmahr answers. “Now unsheathe your blade and fight with honour.” He commands the Archon. “What? You audacity to order me around?” Khandhar questions his bodyguard. “You’re my bodyguard, you’re supposed to be loyal to me!” Lysmahr pushes him to the ground and he falls face first. “Get up. And fight.” Lysmahr commanded the Archon. “You have no choice in this.” Khandhar pushes himself off the ground and grabs his blade, he holds it with both hands and now both combatants circle each other. They both wait for the other to strike first, but no it’ll take two long intense minutes for one of them to swing their blade first. But the fear grew like a virus within Khandhar he knew he was going to die so he might as well try to make the master of blades bleed. He rushed towards Drazhar and he swings his blade at him, however Drazhar blocks the strike and shatters Khandhar’s blade into hundreds of pieces, Drazhar then uses his other blade to slice the Archons lower half of his body and then stabs him in the chest with force. Drazhar did all of this in under a fraction of a second. The nearby Incubi and Drukhari cheer and roar with glee, silencing Khandhar’s screams of pain and horror. Drazhar throws the severed torso of Khandhar off his blade, Lysmahr kneels to it and whispers in Khandhar’s ear. “We don’t need your cowardly leadership, we will be taking that army though.” “P-please kill me.” The Archon begs for mercy. "No, don’t worry you’ll be cloned the next day, I’ve made sure of it.” Lysmahr says to the dying torso. “But if I was you I’d stay dead.” The life from the torso faded away as the crowd continues to cheer. “We shall make use of your plan, the difference is you won’t take all the glory.” Lysmah speaks to the dead body. Now the army marches to the nearest webway portal that shall lead them to Equestria, they will be in delight over the suffering of this innocent world once they invade. Back at Ponyville, Twilight Sparkle can be seen meditating outside of Sweet apple orchard, her and Asurmen thought this would be a peaceful place to help her concentrate on learning how to take her war mask on and off. The light breeze on her skin, the the whistling of birds, the smell of fresh air. It’s almost perfect, the only problem is that Twilight can’t seem to get it right. “Clear your mind Sparkle, concentrate. Your progress is very disappointing.” Asurmen has been badgering Twilight to do better, it doesn’t matter if it was only once in a while, however Asurmen has been nagging at her for the last three hours. “Your mind is slipping again, how are you gong to fight in wars if you can’t even do a simple task?” “Well maybe I can concentrate better if you stop complaining, ever thought about that?” Twilight snaps back. “I have seen Eldar put on their war masks on in the middle of battle, you can’t even do it in three hours.” Asurmen points out. “Your clouded with doubt, stress and self hatred. I can feel it, what are you afraid of?” He asks. Twilight tries to avoid the question by ignoring him, yet he’s very persistent. “Twilight if you tell me what’s wrong your mind will become clear and everything will flow more smoothly.” “I can’t tell you, what if someone hears?” Twilight worries. “What if they tell everyone else about my secret?” “Sparkle I assure you no one’s around but you and me. So tell me, what are you afraid of?” Twilight relaxes herself. “I suppose there’s no harm in telling you, seen as you can’t interact with any one but me.” The thought of telling someone brings some weight of her shoulders. “You see I’m, how do I put this? I think I’m-” Suddenly, Applejack seemingly appeared out of no where. “Howdy.” She said “What are you doin on my farm.” “Applejack!” Twilight says with shock. “What are you doing here?” With a deadpanned expression Applejack didn’t need to answer the question. “Oh right you live here.” Twilight answers her own question sheepishly. “I-I was just... Meditating.” “I see... Welp, I’m just gonna leave you to it then.” Applejack leaves Twilight alone. “Wait.” Twilight tells Applejack. “I haven’t seen you in a week, are you avoiding me?” She asks. “I’m just busy Twi, a lot of Apples need sorting.” “You didn’t even visit me at the hospital.” Twilight mentions. “Is this because I was possessed?” Applejack took a moment to answer, she begrudgingly sat next to Twilight and starts telling her the truth. “Twilight I wanted to come and visit you at the hospital, but after all that ruckus that happened back at Canterlot I just couldn’t. I even wanted to chat to you a few days earlier until I saw you talking to yourself as you were punching a tree.” “Oh... you saw that?” Twilight asks awkwardly. “Yeah, I did.” Applejack said. “I don’t know what happened that day but you seemed had gotten some screws loose afterwards. You’re not normally like this, your a book nerd, the smartest pony I know who doesn’t even like fighting and yet you’re kicking ass and taking names.” “But ponies change overtime.” “Yeah, but not overnight.” Applejack sighs. “Be honest with me Twilight, why are you doing this?” She asks. “All this meditating and fighting, you’ve even gained some muscle whilst doing it.” Twilight hadn’t notice that she’s got some muscle, her biceps look bigger than they did before, she’s even got some abs as well. ‘Woah’ she thought. She looks like Rainbow Dash with the small amount of muscle she’s gained over a week. Yet It’s scary at the same time, there’s no way that a pony can gain this much muscle in a week. She suspects it has something to do with the workout routine she’s been on the past week. Twilight then answers Applejacks question honestly. “I’m doing this because after what Chrysalis did to me, I needed another purpose in life before Celestia tells me I’m no longer her student. Because I can’t do magic anymore.” “Twilight you know Celestia won’t straight up abandon you.” Says Applejack. “She’s like a mother to you.” “I have no use for her though, what good am I without magic?” A moment of silence casts down on the two. Applejack doesn’t know how to answer that, right now it’s unknown what Celestia would do. Twilight on the other hand suspects that she might be correct. “Also my soul has merged with the entity in the armour!” Twilight blurts out quickly. “What?!” Applejack yells in surprise. “He’s here? Sharing your body?!” “I’m sorry but I needed to get that of my chest. But he isn’t in control, not unless I tell him to.” Twilight reassures Applejack. “Well next time that thing takes over I’m gonna give him a piece of my mind! He hurt you and Fluttershy!” Applejack takes her aggression out on the entity, Asurmen finds her aggressiveness towards him feeble but understandable. She takes a deep breath to calm down and she apologises to Twilight. “Sorry about that, it’s been a long few weeks for me.” “Me too Applejack, me too.” Says Twilight. “Could you keep this a secret, I don’t want our friends to worry about this.” “I will, but you should know I’m terrible at keeping secrets.” They both smile and Applejack finally fulfilled her promise. “Quick question, what’s he like?” “A pain in my ass.” Twilight and Applejack laugh, Asurmen rolled his eyes. Later that afternoon Twilight decided to take a break from her training and has a walk down the village, it was relatively peaceful. The sun is setting, children were playing in the streets, ponies were going along with their day and the shops are about to close for the evening. Business as usual it seems, it would be peaceful if Asurmen wasn’t nagging at her about sticking to the training routine. “You still haven’t completed your meditation, you still don’t know how to put on your war mask.” Asurmen scolds at her, but Twilight ignores him so she doesn’t look as if she’s gone insane in the middle of the street. “Twilight do you wish to be an Aspect warrior or not, if so stick to the routine.” “No need to be so pessimistic, I’m only having a break.” She told the Asurmen. “Besides we can continue tomorrow.” Asurmen mumbles to himself before replying. “Fine, but do not get distracted when were training again. That friend of yours doesn’t realise that you’re on a strict schedule.” Twilight whispered. “She’s my friend, am I not allowed to talk to my friends.” “Unless she wishes to be an aspect warrior.” “By Celestia, who hurt you when you were a child?” Twilight mumbles with a sarcastic tone. Both stayed quiet for the rest of the walk, until she bumps into a bat pony, there are three of them and they’re wearing dark purple armour with bits of metallic silver. All tree of them carry spears as their main weapon, strange thing is, they don’t normally come out during daylight, it must be important. “Twilight Sparkle?” One of them asks if they’re talking to the pony in question. “Yes I’m Twilight Sparkle, is there something wrong?” Twilight questions the lunar guards. “It’s princess Luna, she wishes to speak to you at one. It’s of the upmost importance.” “If Luna wishes to Speak to me, she’s gonna have to wait. I’m on a break.” She attempts to move past the guards but they stop her from doing so. “I’m sorry ma’am, but you don’t understand. This is urgent.” “How urgent?” She asks. “I don’t want to cause panic but it’s the Crystal Empire, she believes it’s in danger.” The bat pony informs. “No if you’d kindly take you to Luna, she’ll tell you the rest.” Twilight understands what’s going on now, she agrees to follow them. Later that night they reach Canterlot castle and into Princess Luna’s quarters, once Twilight enters she sees Luna on the balcony, she looks tired and scared as if she’d seen a ghost or some other dark entity. The guards shut the door behind Twilight but not before giving her this advice. “Don’t make her angry. I’ve heard enough shouting from her all week.” She carefully walks toward her and asks. “Luna, are you okay?” It took a moment for Luna to speak back, and when she did her voice sounded like she was about to yell, but holds back her fear, and anger. “I wish to speak to Asurmen.” Twilights heart started racing. “Don’t worry Twilight, my sister told me everything. But please let me speak to him.” “I’m sorry, but I can’t let him control me again.” Twilights voice shudders. “I-I don’t think he can take over without the armour.” The banister on the balcony cracked as Luna's anger begins to boil. “If you value your life you will do as I say.” Twilight started to sweat and her breath became deeper. "I'll ask him." Said Twilight. She was about to ask Asurmen but he answers before she even spoke. "Yes it's possible, though temporary without my armour." "Good, could you do it now?" "I shall. Don’t worry I you’ll have complete control again once we leave this room." Asurmen says before phasing into Twilight. "Well, I'm waiting." Luna raised her voice slightly. Twilight's purple eyes turned into a bright green, her demeanour suddenly changed from nervous to serious, her body took a deep breath as if it was her first and said. “How did you know our souls were merged?" The voice that came out was deep and confident. "You learn a lot when you peek into ponies dreams." Luna told him. “I saw you in every single one of Twilights dreams as soon as I came back. You were talking to her in every single one of them.” “I was preparing her mind for the horrors she has to face.” Asurmen explains. “She wanted to be an aspect warrior and I provide the training for her to become one, you were spying on us.” “I admit I was spying, only because I wasn’t sure whether you were manipulating her or not.” “And your conclusion?” “I’m still unsure, you’re an enigma Asurmen. I can’t tell what your end goal is” Luna says to the possessed Twilight. “But that is not why I called you here, the Crystal Empire is most likely in danger. Something is coming for the crystal heart; and we need to defend it.” “From what?” “I’ve been having visions three days ago, visions that were so real I could swear I was harmed during them. The jesters came into my quarters and gave me visions of what is to come, a dark and twisted being is coming. Terror and doom incarnate, a sorcerer of Chaos.” “Chaos? Now you have my attention. Does this sorcerer have a name?” “He does.” Luna’s voice shudders as if she’s afraid to speak his name. “The jesters call him... Sombra, the master of possession.”