Events post #337: The Second War of Night, Part XXIX: The Liruma Project

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9/20/2022 at 5:33
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The Second War of Night, Part XXIX: The Liruma Project

Shortly after His return from Czjetija and subsequent pardon by Vanguard Sryaen, the Manipulator met with Chairman Inkh to discuss the continuing war with Ohlsana and how to best handle the Shadow Generals recently arrived on the Prime. Severn, ever resourceful and coming to no meeting without a plan in mind, outlined a daring and ambitious scheme, promising that, if the Spires succeeded in carrying out His mission, they would take two Generals down in the process.

Assenting to the plan, Inkh brought few into his confidence as he and his trusted few got to work on the arrangements, details of which are as-yet unknown to the sages of the Grand Library. Time wound on and as Generals fell and invasions and incursions slowed from the initial onslaughts, little news escaped the Spires, much of the citizenry occupied with shadowbreaks but nonetheless eager and restless to take action of their own.

Meanwhile, peculiarities were observed throughout Sapience. Not only had Shadowbound couriers gone inexplicably missing, but new varieties of shadow eld had begun to show up at the leyline foci, in the eld mines, and even in the Iernian Fracture. This latter phenomenon incited considerable panic across Sapience as the emergence of the shadow eld - notably corrosive and consuming - coincided with a sudden massive depletion in the city-states' ylem reserves. Many attributed these developments to the Shadowbound Dreikathi, General Diyomexas, whose whereabouts were and remain unknown - rumours the Spireans themselves were content to fuel. The Grand Library would also like to clarify that though many believed these eld to be Shadowbound, we are able to confirm their existence as simple shadow eld, likely transformed via scientific means.

In late Severin, with yet another temporal coincidence aligning with portentous activity for the Minotaur God, Severn summoned all of Spinesreach to His side and locked the city down to prevent any details from escaping the walls of the Citadel. It is assumed by the Grand Library that this is when the grand feat of science about which we are about to write, took place. While our intelligence is imperfect, we are advised that Tyrant Elene of Bloodloch is cognisant to further details as per her public news posting #6818. As always, we advise careful critical thinking when utilising such postings to establish fact.

As Inkh and Legyn departed from the Spires and made for the Liruma - the former in possession of two Shards of Truth intended as bait, the latter leading a veritable troupe of fellow Archivists behind - the disappearing couriers reappeared en masse in the Dry Plains, delivering missives with haste before departing with similar alacrity back to the Primal Eye to report. At the same time, the familiar violet glow of a burgeoning major focus danced across the horizon.

Generals Telorach and Mazgal, for so long entrenched in their war camp in the Dry Plains, abruptly took their leave as the coming major focus set the continent to rumbling. Shadowbound troops joined them, marching south with discipline beyond their typically reckless belligerence. Holding their tongues, the soldiers also held to their formations, marching with purpose into the Liruma Scrublands. The host quickly split themselves into smaller divisions and converged in the north, the bulk of them taking up positions and beginning a patrol.

When the familiar inelegant patterns of green light flitted across the skyline, Telorach's roar split the air, heard long before the General came into view. Heinously proportioned, the ascended shadow beast lumbered into the Liruma Scrublands, coagulated shadow writhing grotesquely to shape its terrible form. Mazgal's arrival came with no greater attempts at subtlety, the might of the Earthen, tainted and twisted by Ohlsana though it was, on full display. Thundering steps carried him into the Liruma, minor fissures and cracks splintering away from wheresoever his tread landed.

Immediately, a sonorous rumbling and great splitting of the earth presaged Ivoln's eruption from below the ground, His attention drawn by the traitorous Earthen stalking the scrub. The Hlugnic-formed God wore a look stark enough to wither stone itself, moving forward with obvious intent to make war. "Fool," spoke a voice then from everywhere and nowhere, reverberating with chill authority. The Earthen Father stilled in His tracks, becoming wary and suddenly alert. Before Earth could take another stride toward His foe, the bullish figure of Severn stepped out of the shadows. Taking Ivoln by the arm, the Minotaur God dragged Him away from the frontline, the Two vanishing without further trace.

Dozens flocked into the Liruma, drawn by the presence of the Generals and the major focus that by now was imminent, though the Archivists, all but Legyn himself, returned to Spinesreach. When at last the brilliant beam of lighted erupted to herald its manifestation, no instability came, nor sign of ylem energy peppering the area as it normally would. They would not have to wait long for it.

Peculiar lights flickered at the outskirts of the Liruma, burgeoning pinpricks shedding effulgent sparks which soon conjoined with all the others, the Scrubland bordered in bright, eerily integrous beams. A frisson of something unknown sparked through the air, the light seeming to stretch, expanding upwards and outwards. Taking form in the midst of this cascading lucent phenomenon, geometric shapes emerged like cresting waves limned in penumbral magic burning with preternatural translucence. Each flawlessly melded with the next and the next and the next, Rafic flowing into Yuef into Ef'tig and repeating until a singular whole formed across the Liruma's peripheral borders.

Some tried to flee but found themselves incapable, as though the air itself were conspiring to deny them egress. Thousands of overlapping and interlocking patterns manifested a confining matrix of diagrammatic immurement, reality acquiescing to the harmonious music of Creation's ineffable Spheres drawn through the liminal barriers of the world and
wielded by daring, ever-audacious hands. The web of expanding geometries pulsed once, twice, and a third time, as if challenging reality to defy its formation. With an authoritative toll reminiscent of a twice-struck gong it snapped firmly into place and vanished from sight, the feat of numerological elicitation now invisible but inexorably palpable.

Sequestered from the world at large by dint of geometric conjuration, the Liruma remained calm and tranquil, an onlooker's eyes revealing nothing beyond the ordinary plains and those standing among them. Caught in the esoteric snare, the two Generals urgently attempted to discern the source of their entrapment, beast and Earthen working in tandem to unravel the mystifying barricades risen up against them. And then, unseen and all but unheard amidst the clamour, clandestine figures exhale sighs of relief - and trepidation - as some great and unknowable working at last reached fruition. Those standing with Inkh in the Liruma noticed then the opening of a wormhole that delivered a large bomb infused with ylem energy into the scrublands. Amongst them, Mjoll quickly caught on to what was happening and yell of warning echoed across the Bloodlochian aether - but by then it was too late.

For a moment, reality screamed.

In a ylem-stoked blaze beyond all reckoning, the very earth churned, tumbled, and found itself set aflame as the lifeblood of Creation surged forth in a heinous torrent, threatening to obliterate every hint of life within what was once the Liruma Scrublands in a pall of sky-illuminating fury. Like the birth of a second sun, refulgent rays of utter devastation cast the northern mountains of Sapience in sharp relief, the towering shadows of the Dragon's Spires extending across the continent in exaggerated figures of claw and nail.

Somehow contained by a grand numerological elicitation, the burning ire of ylemfire only escalated further amidst its confines, fuelled and spurned to ever-increasing levels by invisible eddies of arcane puissance. Nothing was spared - not stone nor metal, as the ground paradoxically combusted beneath ylemnic transfiguration. Paralysed by the horror unfolding all around them, those trapped within the Liruma could only watch, frozen, as the land beneath their feet disappeared in a conflagration of celestial magnitude.

Words can scarcely describe the magnitude of the explosion which followed, the entirety of Sapience becoming starkly aware of it by light and trembling, shaking, quavering earth alike. Mazgal and Telorach, ensorcelled within the blast radius, were exterminated in an instant, the Earthen blasted to bits while the shadow beast simply warped out of existence. So too were the dozens gathered and unable to retreat, even resurrection bringing with it a lingering ylem sickness which again claimed their lives soon after. The elated screams of Legyn pierced the air in the wake of the inconceivably potent detonation, joy and rapture overtaking him as he was sublimated by the Spheres of Creation and deluged in an elicitation of unfathomable arcane magnitude.

As the raging energies of the disturbed Liruma ley roiled and seethed betwixt the recursive warding containing them, a low groan began to sound at the very edge of hearing, like a great heaving of wordless weight grinding against another. After nearly a minute of this starwrought event, even the incredible elicitation of the Archivium finally reached its limit, and with a monumental crack and the sound of shattering glass, a thread of insurmountable power groaned as it was pulled unimaginably taut. It took merely a parting flare from the dwindling ylemfire, and something at last gave way under the strain.

The ylemfire surged free from its numerologically-imposed borders and spread into the nearby Aureliana, the explosive energy revelling in newfound freedom to wreak havoc on all within its reach. Trees and shrubs were vapourised in a meagre instant; foliage and fauna became ashes, and the desert sands boiled instantly to glass which fractured upwards, raining fragmented shards on the wastelands left behind.

Spooling outwards, a great arc of arcane energy unwound violently from the earth below, screaming out into the firmament and blasting a city-shaped hole in Angelbane's dire projection as it surged away into the cosmos, the tenebrous gloam slithering back together again in mere moments. As the energy travelled away from Aetolia and pierced the membrane of reality, the groaning grew to a dull rumble, and then, in a moment of nauseating finality, something fundamental shifted slightly out of place in a soul-churning CLICK. (The sages of the Grand Library would like to note that we are not aware of precisely what occurred, and will not be taking questions on the matter, so please do not ask.)

Eocik's voice rang out in the immediate aftermath, reminding the world that his warning signalled the end of the Cabal, and proclaiming that ignorance of said warning now spelled the end of "us all", asking simply, "What have you done?" before falling quiet.

While Sapience took a breath for some long minutes, all three non-Spirean states declared war upon the Spires, connecting the appearance of the shadow eld and the draining of their pylons to Spirean machinations. Ohlsana was, of course, not yet finished. A long, spindly shadow fell over the Dry Plains as a humanoid mass of darkness coalesced into existence, time itself seeming to warp around the eldritch entity's spectral figure. Left behind to oversee the command post as the Generals marched to meet their doom, Shadow Lieutenant Ageless made its presence known with an eerie, reverberating rattle as it staked a claim on the ground it stood upon, foretelling a future in which it would be undefeated. Already roused to ire, Sapience came together as a hammer determined to meet the nail, some sixty adventurers throwing themselves into battle against the Lieutenant who rapidly fell under the magnitude of the combined onslaught.

While Time's disparate rivulets returned to their normal flow and the two halves of Ageless were put down, the air remained alive, electrified with the explosive release of unimaginable volumes of energy. Far above Sapience, beyond the dome of the world, Shadow General Irgech cast a sobering glance upon the realm below, the integrity of the dark star no less vital, no less absolute, despite the massive torrent of unleashed power punching through the very fringes of Creation's farthest reach. Largely unconcerned with the celestial phenomenon, most of the world spent their ire in only one direction: Spinesreach. Having received declarations of war from Bloodloch, Duiran, and Enorian, the Spires immediately came under attack, dozens of their guards falling in the opening skirmish of what is likely to be a bloody campaign.

Penned by my hand on Kinsday, the 22nd of Severin, in the year 505 MA.