Chapter Text
Heraki stood before her fellow Daemonsmiths and Sorcerer-Prophets The Tower of Zharr-Naggrund, the Grand Conclave of her people that ruled over the Dark Lands… and their slaves. They were all slaves to the Father of Darkness, in the end, but it was the nature of slaves to fight over their position. Goblins and Orcs were too stupid to try to find anything but in violence. The Sorcerer-Prophets, the Daemonsmiths, the slaves to Hashut… they found other ways of punishing failure. Reassignment to the Black Fortress, or the edges of the empire, away from Zharr-Naggrund. For others… Execution, Exile, or fates to which either would have been preferable. Hashut, the Father in Darkness taught them this, and she knew it. An Honest God, one that was consistent.
The God of what the Umgi called the Dwarfs of Fire. Others called them Mutants, Daemon-worshippers, and even more called them slaves.. And that last one was close to the truth… but they didn’t realize why, or that they were slaves themselves, to other, worse masters.
That is why they were the Dawi-Zharr… or the Sons and Daughters of Hashut. It mattered little what title they had; they were the servants of Hashut. At least, that is how Heraki saw it.
“Is this how you reward me for my service?”
She had been born after their entrance to the Dark Lands; a rare birth, to be a female dwarf, but a blessing from what Hashut had saved them from. Her grandfather before his passing told her of it; her uncles falling from the womb, festering, Warriors who stood against the worst of Orcs begging for death and mercy from Valaya and finding nothing but silence…
Left in the dark, unable to do anything to fight their demise but beg for salvation… no matter the cost to their souls and bodies. And did they grow weak? Did they suffer from this loss? NO! They ruled the darklands and made laborers of those that had once inspired such hatred. Such was the Will of Hashut.
She thought of this as her trial commenced: her husband’s experiments had created the worst slave revolt they have ever seen; many kinsmen had died to put them down, and it was only thanks to the hobgoblins their Black Orc rebellion was put down…
And examples needed to be made, even among her people.
Astragoth, the kruting little wanaz, was pleased. The skruf of his black beard and beady-red eyes looked at her like the starved wolf at his hobgoblin master’s prey. He had her right where he wanted her; and he’d take her seats on the council should this go his way. The wanaz probably already had most of the world
“Heraki Ashen-Veins, Daemonsmith of the Council, you are charged with the experiments upon the Urks,” He began making his case with those words, seeming to relish this. “Charged with supplying the Blood of Hashut to these experiments. It worked quite well; thousands of our kinsmen lie dead due to the actions of your husband. Treason such as this cannot go unanswered!”
No one dared to question; bonds of kinship meant little when there was a chance to rise through the ranks and make an example in the name of Hashut. “She refuses,” he added, almost as an Afterthought. “To explain her work with the Blood of Hashut. She refuses to aid in our understanding of Hashut’s gifts!’
“The damage to my Tower has been immense! I Demand-”
“-My Hat-Factory will NEVER recover! My orders are-”
“-The Hobgoblins whisper of betrayal! Yes, this is her fault! Skin her-”
“ORDER! Astragoth, that is enough.” The current leader of the Conclave, the Sorcerer-Prophet Harzra Oathkiller said. He looked down upon her, the others on the Conclave all stared at her… judging her. She had allies once… when her rivals were on the other side. “What do you say in your defense to these accusations?”
“... We are not a people unused to suffering. To setback… to failure.” She began slowly. “We were lost in darkness once… once we cared. For all our bickering, we were united in our understanding of Hashut.” she smiled despite herself. “... Or so I thought. All of you, all of you think yourself the masters of your own holds. The Dark Father’s bickering children.”
She pressed a vial she had hidden on her person; the Blood of Hashut. “You simply wish to tear down a mighty Dawi because you are afraid. My idiot husband is already dead, murdered by his creation.”
Weakness was not something allowed. Any sign of it and even the hobgoblins might try their luck with your back, something Hekari knew applied to all of them. “You are vultures! Craven gobi attempting to steal that which you understand little…. And you shall have NONE if you do not allow me to walk out of this room right now.”
Astragoth growled. “Is that a confession?”
She showed her left hand… some of her fingers were stone already… most of her left foot as well, and yet she should have been up to her waist in the curse. Or so the rumors go. She had lived a long life, had children… In the next century she might have to join the harridans but for now, she was the picture of what a Dawi-Zharr woman could accomplish.
And she’d ingrain it into this Conclave. For Father Hashut. “The Dark Father will not let you have my work, wanaz. We all know this trial was decided long before it started. You all wish for something of me… and you will not have it if I do not leave here, to take my place on the road to Zharr-Naggrund, as Hashut demands.Or do you think yourself above even the Dread Father?”
Arguments began again, silenced by the fall of a Bull Centaur’s hoof on the dark stone floor. “... Those who find her terms acceptable?”
“You cannot possibly think this woman would-”
“The Blood of Hashut! It is our own savior’s precious ichor, a gift-”
“She is a schemer and a krut!, A poorly used-”
The Bull Centaur roared and silently ruled for a moment.
She knew the sentence then and there.. But then she took out the vial. “I will sentence myself now then. May you live long and suffer, Astragoth. May you ALL suffer twice of all that you have inflicted on me! I will not suffer because of Skrufwanaz like YOU any longer. FOR THE GLORY OF HASHUT!”
With just some of her magic, her spell took place. Some of the more foolish and skittish counselors, who would find themselves ‘removed’ soon after, hid… Others, however, just watched, trying to note this magic for their own use… but Astragoth seemed to know EXACTLY what she was doing… and merely scowled.
As stone covered her body, the vial broke and dropped… and he knew he had been cheated. The Father in Darkness would mock his failure in getting her knowledge… but no matter.
He had already outlived her. The ashen, gray stone figure of the Daemon-smith would irritate him for the rest of his life, but… This “Blood of Hashut” She discovered, its secrets would be his, and thus shattering her to pieces, cathartic as it would be… he would find ways of learning her secrets.
But he had time; he had the ambition and devotion to rise. All would know his name…
—-
*Centuries later*
He didn’t have a face. None of them aside from the Commander of the Black Fortress did. The failures of his clan had sentenced him to an eternity of service to the Infernal Guard, unless he earned his redemption from the fires of Hashut itself. The Dawi-Zharr had no reason to be forgiving; the Dark Lands were as cruel as the people who ruled it and even before the separation their people knew how to hold a Grudge. Perhaps one day he would be allowed to show his face… unlikely as it was.
The Legion of Azgorath had expanded east, as it had done before… and it had won. The Great Bastion, this supposed impenetrable fortress (which had, of course, been broken into countless times, but such was the umgak both the Cathays and the Krugan had to work with) and it fell. They fought back… they still fought because this was their Emperor’s body…
And so the Legion of Azgorath were happy to drop one small dagger. The Kurgan world tear into the body of Cathay, to tear his entrails and soul… but they were happy simply to make the Dragon suffer.
The faceless dawi-zharr followed his lord to a place above the battlements,overlooking the reign of terror and destruction beneath them. They called them cities… once, but now they looked much more like the pile of ruins and rubble they always were in the eyes of the Dawi-Zharr. The Smell of smoke and charred flesh, the screams of laborers being ‘inducted’...
“The Black Tower rises.” Dhrahoath said with a snort. “They will take the Bastion eventually… but not the ‘Turtle Gate’. Our little Daemonsmith will care for it.” He smiled cruelly as he gazed upon the form of a failure; a female dwarf, proud, cruel. Long curled locks, a mighty hat and two horns, the right just being slightly bigger. There were stories about her, when he had been working under the thrice-cursed Astragoth. A woman, being a Daemonsmith… rare of course but not impossible.
And yet, the stone curse got to her too, turned all at once in the Conclave according to rumors when he was there. One of the few to ever join the Sentries of Zharr-Naggrund of her own accord.
“You will stand watch over these lands, the rituals we carry out here will desecrate this place.. A seeping wound upon this so-called Dragon Emperor. Let these kurgans push as far as they can from this place… succeed or pray to Hashut you can be forgiven.’
“HASHUT! VORGUND! ZHARR-NAGGRUND!”
And with one last look at Astragoth’s… donation to the cause the Lord of the Black Fortress left…. It might have been a figment of his mind but… it looked at him for a moment. Perhaps some clarity in that stone form?
He always thought it looked familiar… but perhaps his hat had been getting a bit too tight lately. The world was going mad, and perhaps then, the Dawi-Zharr would dig, and dig, deep enough to find another place, to forget this madness, to continue the fire of industry and tyranny… but it was Cathay’s end. A green tide would spread across the land soon enough, even if not commanded by the children of the Father In Darkness…
Let them all suffer.
—-
The city of Wei-Jin stormed with magic, so powerful it could be seen by the walls beyond. Enough for Hekari to awaken from her sleep once again… to see the end of her world. The Magical energies from the the Celestial City semeed to rise and rise, ultimately aiding int he Warp Storms that would soon take the world.
Narrad, Snagga. Az brus drâghûrz ar alt.
Her eyes would have widened at the voice; dark, speaking in a tongue cruel and terrible and yet… she knew.
The world rumbled, the skies tore open, the world was taking it’s last breaths. She could have used this to undo her spell, but… no, not here, in foreign lands, far from the Dark Lands. Not when…
All she could do was pray to Hashut before the stone sleep took her once again. A witness to the last moments of the world… once last indication of the power of Chaos…to unmake a thing simply because it could.
The World ended in a storm of magic. The skies bled, stone melted, iron cried. The world they had exploited and struggled on ended in much the same way. The faceless Infernal Guard held. They were forged to survive the Dark lands, but even then, the world fell away… blinding lights and magic, the sheer force of which killed and destroyed the world around them and YET, somehow… they were falling, there was ground?
The crash was painful, but they endured. The Land was… strange, dark… A fortress stood in the distance, but not of Dawi-Zharr or Cathayan design. The Bull Taur’ruk and the few of his kind that managed to make it, their war machines were in shambles, wreckage and scrap metal. The K’Daai simply burnt out, sighs of relief and agony alike came as they simply became inanimate…
The faceless servants of Azgorh looked around their environment. The Portal, empowered by Hashut’s blood, activated by the means only the magic-wielders could properly understand, Hashut had no need for them… no, he only needed her.
She watched them, one of many taking the time to check on her, as if she was a prized artifact (which, she supposed, she technically was.)
“Where are we?”
“We should just be glad to be alive... It’s almost like home.”
The land itself was dark, barren. Nothing grew here, nor would anything. The soil was dark, the sky was still screaming before it closed with a thundercrack, revealing a dark sky. Dawi, Dawi-Zharr or not didn’t need the sun to see… but the darkness that fell was deep, only the light of embers of their weapons and the rubble that passed through with them.
And perhaps, if they had been somewhere close to home, they could have won against the threat that came for them. Hekari however, could only watch as it seemed the shadows themselves were on the move. It was not the lore of Shadows; these beings had faces, eyes glowing with the malice of daemons of all different shapes of beasts.
"Hashut! Vorgund! Zharr-Naggrund!”
The Dawi-Zharr did not just survive; they revealed the power of Hashut, they turned their anger into fire. Their hatred turned into tyranny… but these things did not have that. They were not k'daai, and they were not daemons… they simply hated. The Legions were traded to deal with all sorts of monsters, but these were quick, brutal, and perfectly in synch. The worst of demons and the undead.
A large thing that looked like a giant riding a horse fused to it in grim parody, a single beast acting as a cavalry charge with no concern for its own life. It fell to a hail of fire-glaive shows, but the crushed forms cut open, the screaming pain of their forms as they died… they were quickly finished off or crushed by other monsters coming to deal with them.
The monsters fought with furry, the Great Bird Simply lifted up the Bull-Centaur and threw it on top of his allies. Crushing all to death There were far, far too many to be defeated. Only the Statue of Heraki remained. The face infernal guard could only hope she could not see… this would be their last stand.
“Hashut! Vorgund! Zharr Naggrund!” The number of those voices shouting the time-honored battle-cry of the Dawi-Zharr, but the monsters were undeterred. The Fire-Glavies were targeted next, slowly, but surely being slaughtered by the flying crows. Any that fell down simply vanished like daemons. Hekari could have seen hundreds of her own kinsmen die… but not like this.
This was not a foe that cared. This was a foe that simply wished for them to die. They didn’t try to fight for glory like daemons did. They were colder, more calculating; they were surrounded. Lost in the dark against monsters. Faster, stronger… but there was still courage. “HASHUT! VORGUN-”
That one was knocked into her by some creature that took the form of a bear. The beasts didn’t even stop to eat, they worked as one… Tearing through metal and armor with mechanical precision.
And they looked. At. her. They could sense her fear, the horror of it… and yet, they seemed to hesitate upon seeing her… it was then she felt the cold, cold stone reclaim her, magic seeping from her despite her being it to say… and yet, she saw something tale, pale… and cruel as her own people approach her.
It was then the spell faded and she was inanimate once more.
—-
Arthur Watts was a man of science. Yes, his employer was as close as one could get to the opposite of it, but what did that matter really? And in her library, he had access to books that offered so much knowledge… and her fictional works but personally, he preferred to stick to the sciences (not the least of which for her preferred genre…)
Crack.
He looked up from his book, the unusual statue Salem had placed there. Posed as if the subject was some zealous figure, it was almost like an ash-like slate, but its eyes held a particular fury. Ash-gray curls and a patently ridiculous and oversized hat (on which sat a few books). Salem found it… ‘curiously interesting’ which he assumed as ‘cute’ but whatever civilization had made it must have thought the subject a vile little demon.
That was odd, actually, was that crack there that wasn’t there before… in fact, even more started to appear.
It crumbled, stone flaking off as it turned to flesh, coughing. Then the small female... Thing with a big hat shook off the books and looked at Watts with eyes full of bile and hatred. “Wanrag Or, Umgi?” She barked… her clothing and robes, which seemed to be decorated with metal, were mostly ash-grey, but gunmetal around the edges. She seemed to be furious and confused, which are rarely a good combination when dealing with aliens… which this had to be.
Watts stood up, not sure what to do, just looking at the hateful and annoyed stare while he tried to find his way to the door.
“Wanrag ek umgizaki?” It asked, or he assumed it was infuriated.
It closed in on him slowly, with its stubby legs he reckoned he could outrun her but she raised her and and… seemed confused as it lacked some of it’s fingers then the other but nothing happened… infuriated by this, it looked on, sighed and rammed into him with force, knocking him to the floor.
“WANRAG OR, WAZZOCK!”
Her hands found purchase on his neck and she began to strangle him… and that was when Salem walked in.
Salem and the creature exchanged a glance, her hands not moving from the spot… The creature seemed to take her rather well. “Ek! Wanrag or?”
Salem blinked… and blinked. Watts began to feel lightheaded as her grip tightened.
“WAZZOKS!”
It let go of Watts, the man breathing once again as Salem looked at them, the rubble and the books over there, and made the obvious connection. “Do you speak my tongue?”
“Ai bar ek-” Salem lifted her hand and merely lifted the thing up upside down. It held onto its hat as Watts stood again, feeling his neck. And just happy to breathe.
It screamed and cursed at them before uttering in an odd dialect. “Mutant Woman! Put me down!”
“Ah, see, that wasn’t so hard…” Salem frowned.
“I will feed the weakling’s manhood to a taurus if you do no-”
Salem just dragged it out of the room, Watts followed… it looked at the two of them with a hatred he never quite felt before… As if their mere existence was a sin.
—-
Hekari sat in the cell. She was given food… and she only begrudgingly ate it. Umgak; stale bread, no meat… and she knew from just looking at them they thought highly of themselves. That woman… those eyes…
They were those of her kin. She was Dawr, likely, but not quite right. She was something… something terrible to behold. Was that how the gobi and urk slaves saw them? … Good. Perhaps she could find a way to sway her.
The Umgi woman was clearly corrupted, but by what god? None of the Four mighty ones, nor the vermin-god… Perhaps another like Malal? The Dark Master? The God of the Forge of Souls, maybe even Father Hashut? Perhaps something worse? She simply waited. Her own magic seemed… lesser. She couldn’t place her finger on why; there was just enough in the air, but her body couldn’t channel it… Then again it was only due to the Dark Father her kind could cast at all.
Looking down to her hand, she had lost a few fingers and toes… that might be a problem for later; with some metal and what magic she had she could likely create good enough replacements. Assuming of course her captor would let her out, and not use her in a ritual in front of some umgak shrine. Probably wouldn’t even sacrifice her properly either.
Footsteps made her kick the tray away and stand, it was the tall mutant and her follower; The scrawny weak one who seemed to be studying in her library. He seemed to be annoyed for her attempting to discipline him, as were most of the umgi laborers back in the Dark Lands.
“Come to gawk?” Herkari growled. “I am not something to be kept in your menagerie, Umgi.”
The Woman had the audacity to lean so she could be at eye-level with her. “Of course, you’re not… but attacking my associate as your first act upon leaving that state of yours does require some punishment.”
“Your minion is not of my concern. He should have known better than to question one such as me.”
“I didn’t know your language.”
“And that would have taught you your mistake, umgi.” Hekari replied.
“Is that your word for a human?”
“Aye. Do you know what I am?” She frowned, not liking the confusion on their faces to the question, looking at the mutant.
“Hmm, well, I do, to a degree. Though not the name. Your people had a run of… misfortune a few years ago.”
“I saw.”
“Ah… Not many would willingly walk into this place. How did they come to be here?”
Hekari paused, for once in her life she didn’t not have a pithy quick answer. “... What does that matter? It is the will of Hashut, or whatever dark powers are at work in this place.”
The woman’s expression faltered for a moment, just one moment. “I am the only ‘power’ here.”
“You’d do well to respect her… you’ll last longer.” the skinny one said in annoyance. Did this woman allow her laboreors talk out of turn? Umgak ‘quality’ in action, the dwarf proposed.
Hekari coughed. “My people are the dawi-zharr, the ‘dwarfs of fire’ in your-” Wretched? Primitive? “Umgak tongue. Some sort of arcane backlash is likely responsible for my current…? Why are you looking at me like that?”
“Oh no, no please, continue.”
“... I knew I was not in the place of my birth, despite the similarities…. Where am I?”
“Remnant, and I feel we have much to discuss.” She looked to her servant. “It seems you are no longer necessary for the moment, you are dismissed…”
She watched the servant go, grumbling just a bit about how ‘it almost killed him’ but honestly it was only a modest, disciplinary strangle, like she used to do to her hobgoblins. Really were humans that weak? She supposed it was why Hashut only had them as slaves beneath the Dawi-Zharr. “This world is called Remnant, and magic has not been on this world for millennia… Your species is new however.”
She paused, looking closer at Hekari. “So, tell me about your world, little-”
“LITTLE?! WHO ARE YOU CALLING LITTLE?! I, I AM TALL, YOU ARE LITTLE! IGNORE THOSE ORBS YOU CALL EYEBALLS YOU FOOLISH SLA-”
Hekari was thrown into the wall. The pain was sharp and reminded her of who was who’s prisoner. “Oh, look what you’ve made me do. I’m sorry… I believe I said I have the power here. My name is Salem… and I think that is a sufficient introduction.”
Salem seemed vaguely interested as Hekari stood up again. “You… you’re a sorceress? Some sort of elgi? No… you’ve not got the ears for that.”
“What an interesting creature you are. Most life in this world would be out cold by a blow like that… must be the hat.”
Hekari snorted. “Very funny… Now, what do you want with me? Really? If you’re going to kill me just do so.”
“I already have enough of your people’s corpses in my laboratories. I’m not quite interested in another, but… This world of yours is an outlier. I’d rather hear about it from your point of view.”
Her eyes glistened slightly with anger. “Something has been wrong for a few decades now, and things are in motion… something has changed without my permission in this world… and you are among those.”
She extended a hand. “Now, we can bicker and I simply kill you and perhaps stuff you to continue your work in my library as decor, or…”
—
“... Does it not terrify you to see the remains of your kin?”
Hekari raised her eyebrow. Her lesson in Dawi anatomy stopped in one of Salem’s laboratories. She was eagerly going over the mighty bull Centaur, now long reduced to a few scraps of meat on its skeleton. “They are corpses you have put to use… what else could they serve?”
“I see.” Salem replied, though the answer seemed to displease her. “What makes a Dawi-Zharr fear?”
“Our people are not easily frightened. We are not like our… western kin. We have seen too much to know fear as humans do. We understand it however… Pain and fear were our greatest exports. As I have said, nothing you can do to me can make me afraid.”
“We shall see~.” Salem replied. “But you went to this… Ha-Shut? Out of fear, I merely ask…”
Hekari sneered for a moment. “Not out of fear… out of reverence for what he had did to us.” Hekari paused…
Forsaken… abandoned to the Dark… What Choice but to follow the flame? No matter what it led to, no matter the horrors it revealed…
Hekari studied the eyes of Salem carefully; cold and without pity, the eyes of a Dawi-Zharr who had the power in this situation. No matter how much she was useful, Hekari was at her mercy, as her people had been so long ago to the Father. “... We once worshiped our ancestors. Our valiant warrior Grimnir, the master artisan Grungi, and also Mother of our race, Valya… we were made by them, the first. We are all their children, and we loved them because of it.”
Her face lost its scowl, its hatred, and became almost pitiable to Salem, if she was still capable. “And yet… When disaster struck us, did Grimnir raise a hand to help us? No, our warriors were felled. Did Grungi give us the tools to survive? No, he let us stumble in agony. Did Valya’s love, hearth, and home light the way home? No… She left us to die. Our children died in agony, taken away before they grew a single hair on their chin! And so…” She took a breath… she had never been through that. She had been born when they had renounced the traitors, kin-breaking LIARS but it hurt still… a wound upon a people that would never heal.
“... The Father came to us, offered us salvation.” She said, “He was cruel and terrible… and he did not lie.”
Salem frowned. “So you merely took another god?”
“As did you, I'm sure.” Hekari replied, looking at Salem’s almost marble-like face, the eye just twitched slightly, but that was enough to confirm her suspicions “... There are many different types of Gods, Salem. All of them are liars, oath-breakers… Ursun of the Winterlands was a bear. By his nature, he is a beast. He could silence Winter forever for his people, but he refuses because he needs the cold, needed to be loved… and he made them love him. The other powers in my world did the same; Nagash, Lilieth, and whatever else… but Hashut did not lie. He told us exactly what we were, his slaves and children. The others are deluded if they think otherwise.”
“... go on.” Salem said, with what seemed to be genuine interest.
“Your Gods… I bet they said they loved you, they wanted the best for you… And yet, what was it? The death of your children? A lost love? What was the lie you found out too late?”
Salem shrugged. “All of that and more I suppose. I asked merely to save my love… and I was refused by one, the other brought him back… and then just as easily took him away.” There was pain there; a scar from a lesson earned. “They claimed I did not appreciate life… and when I rose against them, I was not the one punished. The world I knew is not but Dust.”
“You see? The gods are such kind, generous, loving things… until you disobey or question or just ask for something that seems so reasonable… Then, they abandon you. They would rather have punished everyone, the good, the innocent… just to make an example to you. The one who’s knee would not bend.”
She could see Salem agreed. “That is all life, every so-called bond is only lasts so long as it’s useful. They are divided, they would all kill one another if they could, they all use one another… everyone is a slave and Gods are the highest of slaves…slaves to their natures. One small step and those loving, wonderful gods will leave you to suffer.”
“You were always their slave, and only now is that truth made clear.” She laughed without mirth… it hurt. “They didn’t want companions. They wanted slaves. Compliant, unquestioning and should one rise up against them? Well… they made more, didn’t they? Without the flaws….”
It hurts to be alone, to be left in the dark… even Hashut could not hear her here. All she could do was serve a new one…
“Indeed… They remade them. They even brought my beloved back just to twist the knife. They took away the magic they had; they're empty things, deluded puppets without that necessary spark.” Salem agreed. “And it would only come back on their terms.”
Hekari looked at Salem’s eyes again. The Cold, vicious malice she could have only seen in the bull centaurs of Hashut once. “The Gods will pay, in time.” Salem said. “And I will liberate this world from its gods.”
“How?” Hekari asked. “I will make up for any misspoken word here but, how does one take vengeance on gods?”
Salem frowned. “I will make them alone in this cold, dark world. I will make them pay for every indignity ventured unto me… we are kindred spirits it seems, Hekari. They make this cruel world for us to be in, and when we seek our joys, they turn it to ashes. God or not… They tried to teach me a lesson, and they succeeded I would say; They care less for life then I ever could.”
Hekari seemed… intrigued. “And what if they punish you? I doubt those that made you immortal would go back on their word.’
“Let them… the wound inflicted will be more than enough. And I will keep coming back for them, for eternity if I must.” She laughed… it was tinged with no joy, just malice… “They think nothing of me, they think I'm a fool… Perhaps, I am but I will spend eternity to hound them and their works to dust, so long as I live.”
Hekari stared at her for a moment… This mutated umgi was more than even she knew. She could feel it… perhaps this is why Hashut sent her here. Yes; this woman… she had the will to have grudges against the gods themselves.
“Wyrinn…” Hekari said. “... allow me to assist you however you can. I can do far more than illuminate you on trivialities of any of my world’s inhabitants.” Yes, she could feel the fire of her own hate burning again! “I am a Daemonsmith, perhaps I could assist you with the Grimm Liquid of yours? I have studied the process of gods before, perhaps there is a connection… if not, I have many ways of assisting you, or could find a way to serve you.”
Salem frowned, considering. “... Perhaps, there is one matter I've been considering; the Dragon who destroyed my roof. How best to slay it? It interfered once, and I wish it never does so again without suffering a thousand-fold for its sins.”
“Wyrinn,” Hekari said, and now, for perhaps the first time in centuries with genuine happiness. “My people have many ways to slay a dragon.”
“And why would you help me?” Salem asked.
Hekari smiled, sharp fangs ready. “Because Wyrinn… You are a master whose designs are worth following. I swear by Blood, Fire, and the Father of Darkness that I will live and die to curse these gods of yours, and all that stand in that path. Such is the Will of the Ashen-Vein.”