The ink is dry, the page is torn,
To find the place where we were born.
A hand of iron, a heart of rust,
To build a kingdom in the dust.
The weaver sits upon the height,
To watch the fading of the light.
For in the silence of the dawn,
The only king is one who's gone.
The transition from the Unwritten Page back into the Super-Void was not a jump; it was a haemorrhage of reality.
As the Sun-Eater—now a skeletal, necrotic husk of black iron-wood and weeping, silver-glass marrow—tumbled through the final membrane, the white light didn't just fade; it perished. It was replaced by a bruised, turbid purple, thick with the scent of ozone and the metallic tang of ancient, cooling flesh and blood. This was the "New Abyss." It was a world that had been smashed apart and stitched back together with the Ink of Daxian's original sin.
Daxian sat upon the Throne of the Remainder, but it was no longer a seat of "Absolute-Definition." He had smashed down ruthlessly on the silver marble with his meat-hand, turning the throne into a jagged, ugly pile of shattered bones and rusted iron. He was a miserable state of a sovereign.
His right side was a towering structure of iron-wood, the roots having grown so deep into his fractured ribs that they were now part of his very breathing. His skull was partially exploded, and the violet crystal in the gap hummed with a low, jagged frequency that caused the surrounding space to crack and bleed. His eyeballs had popped out, resting deep in their sockets as twin pits of blood red fire that saw the "Profundity" of the world's new, beautiful ugliness.
"Dax... the... portal... is... closing..."
Vane's voice was a miserable neighing rasp. The Lord of the Forge was kneeling at the base of the throne, his bones fractured in many places, his skin opened and flesh split until he looked like a statue of raw, exposed muscle and brass-shards. He was intensely struggling to hold the "Source-Gate" open with a single, bent iron pylon.
"If we... don't... leave... now... we... perish... in... the... White," Vane wheezed, coughing out a breath of turbid air.
Daxian didn't move. He looked at the vast, empty expanse of the Origin-Home. It was no longer a "Temple." It was a graveyard of logic-dust and meat paste.
"The... pipes... Vane," Daxian whispered, his voice an enormous piercing of the silence. "They... need... the... Soot."
The Fighting Scene: The Final Cull of the Logic-Ghosts
The slaughter reached the climax as the "Automated-Cleaners" of the dead Author manifested for one last massacre.
They weren't Wraiths; they were "Logic-Ghosts"—remnant bits of code that had survived the Inking. They moved with lightning speed, their bodies made of flickering silver fire. They didn't have souls. They only had the ambition to "Format" the Soot. They charged forward from the white horizon, their enormous force turning the silver dust into a chaotic battle situation.
Vane laughed malevolently, his smile of disdain fixed on the swarm.
"I'VE... GOT... ONE... MORE... SLAUGHTER... IN... ME!" Vane roared, his eyeballs popped out from the internal pressure.
He didn't have his hammer, so he smashed down ruthlessly with the iron pylon. The enormous shock of the blow smashed apart a hundred ghosts, turning their silver-light into meat paste and logic-dust. Vane was unhindered by the ghosts that pierced into skin and flesh of his legs. He racked his brains to find the most brutal swing, peeling the skin ruthlessly off the air itself.
"COME ON!" Vane screamed, coughing out blood. "IS THIS THE CLIMAX?"
Silas was a miserable state of data-bleed. He was intensely struggling to keep the Sun-Eater's remaining fragments from perishing. He projected a wave of "Pure-Grief" at the swarm. The ghosts smashed apart, their skulls exploded, and they crashed heavily into the ground as their "Logic" was bombarded by human memory.
"The... blood river... it's... flowing... back!" Silas wailed, his flesh split along his seams.
Daxian rose from the broken throne.
He didn't use a technique. He charged forward with the enormous force of a lunatic taking risks. He slammed mercilessly into the center of the swarm, his meat-arm stretching out to wreak havoc.
CRACK.
Daxian's bones jutting out of the body, his skin opened, his flesh and blood reduced to dust. He laughed madly, a smile of disdain for the "Logic." He grabbed a handful of the ghosts and smashed them together until they were meat paste.
"YOU... ARE... NOT... THE... LAW!" Daxian roared, his voice an enormous piercing scream. "I... AM... THE... REMAINDER!"
He smashed apart the "Origin-Source-Node" with an enormous punch. The enormous shock sent a wave of turbid air across the sector, turning the silver fire into soot. The ghosts perished in an instant, their eyeballs popped out and their flesh reduced to dust.
The massacre was over. The Origin was reduced to dust.
The Return to the Broken Plaza
The Sun-Eater—or what was left of it—tumbled through the closing gate and crashed heavily into the ground of New Oakhaven's central plaza.
The impact was an enormous force, creating a deep pit that swallowed the entire district. The silence settling slowly over the city was no longer clinical or empty. It was the silence of a long-awaited sleep, punctuated by the rhythmic drip of the blood river from the World-Tree's roots.
Kael and Elio stood at the edge of the pit. Kael was filled with injuries, his bones fractured in many places, his skin opened. He looked at the wreckage and saw three miserable states of men crawling out of the violet-black smoke.
Vane was first, his bones jutting out, his gaze blood red. He was carrying Silas, who was a faint, flickering shadow of indigo and red.
And then came the Weaver.
Daxian stepped into the mud of the plaza. He was reduced to dust in most places. His skull was exploded, his eyeballs popped out, his flesh split. He was the Sovereign of Rot, a miserable state of a god standing in the meat paste of his own kingdom.
"Architect?" Kael whispered, his voice a miserable neighing of awe.
Daxian looked at the city. He didn't see a "system." He saw a massacre of a construction site. He saw the residents slaughtering each other for the right to fix the sewers. He saw the soot on the children's faces. He saw the unrivaled spirit of a people who had forgotten how to obey.
He curled up his lips and laughed malevolently, a smile of disdain for the "Absolute Logic" that had failed to delete them.
"The... pipes," Daxian wheezed, coughing out a breath of turbid air.
"They're... holding, Dax," Vane said, sitting down in the mud. "They're holding."
Daxian looked at the copper ring in his mud-stained hand. It was charred. It was ugly. It was a mistake. He squeezed it until his bones fractured one last time.
The First Day of the Scratch is not a 'Result.' It is a 'State of Being.' I have slaughtered the Law, and I have smashed apart the Author. I am the Sovereign of the Scrap. And my kingdom is a blood river of beautiful, jagged, painful mistakes. We will wreak havoc on the silence until the universe learns to scream with us.
Daxian gritted his teeth, his blood red eyes finally closing as he crashed heavily into the arms of the people he had slaughtered a billion universes to save.