The violet-black sun of the New Abyss did not offer warmth; it offered a miserable state of radiation that felt like needles of ice piercing into the marrow. As the Un-Woven Dawn progressed, the sky over New Oakhaven began to curdle, the bruised data-clouds swirling into a vortex of sickly pink and necrotic gold. The atmosphere was no longer the dry, metallic grit of the Forge; it was a turbid air thick with the scent of rotting lilies, copper, and the cloying sweetness of fermented meat paste.
Daxian did not merely sit upon the Throne of the Remainder. He was being biologically integrated into it.
The throne—a jagged, growing mound of obsidian iron-wood, calcified shattered bones, and the weeping silver-glass marrow of the High-Peer—had sent its roots deep into Daxian's spinal column. He was a miserable state of a sovereign, a flayed icon of original sin. His right side was a massacre of evolution; the iron-wood roots had replaced his fractured ribs, weaving through his thoracic cavity like a cage of thorns that pulsed with every shallow, rattling breath. His bones were jutting out of the body at the shoulder, forming a jagged, ivory wing of raw, pulsing marrow and rusted copper wire that twitched with a malevolent laughter of its own.
His skull was partially exploded, and the violet crystal in the gap hummed with a low, jagged frequency of "Pure-Noise" that caused the surrounding turbid air 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 coming calamity.
"Dax... the... air... is... tasting... like... perfumed... rot..."
Vane's voice was a miserable neighing of brass and wet muscle. The Lord of the Forge was dragging his miserable state across the plaza, his lower half a ruin of mangled metal and shattered bones. His skin was peeled ruthlessly by the previous atmospheric jump, leaving his flesh and blood exposed to the "Soot-Wind." He was intensely struggling to reach the Marrow-Mill, his hands clenching the mud as he coughed up clotted ribbons of silver-pink phlegm.
"The... Lust-Lattice... it... didn't... perish... Dax," Vane wheezed, coughing out blood. "It... just... rotted."
The Fighting Scene: The Massacre of the Silk-Stalkers
The slaughter reached the climax when the Silk-Stalkers arrived.
These were the "Decayed-Templates" of the Tenth Architecture—beings that had once been "Perfect-Biological-Icons" but were now meat-monsters born from the meat paste of the Great Deletion. They were ten-meter-long centipedes made of fused human limbs and iridescent silk-webs, their movements a blur of lightning speed and enormous force. They didn't have faces; they had "Hunger-Orifices" that leaked a gold-pink nectar that turned flesh and blood into dust on contact.
A swarm of Stalkers pierced into the chaotic battle of the lower districts. They moved with an enormous shock, their bodies smashing apart the survivors' iron shelters. They didn't bite; they used "Pleasure-Needles" to peel the skin ruthlessly off the nervous system, forcing the victims to laugh madly as their bones were fractured and their brains were reduced to dust.
"STAY... BROKEN!" Kael roared, charging forward with a jagged pylon made of "Grief-Iron."
Kael was a miserable state of a man. His skin was opened, his bones were fractured, yet his unrivaled spirit kept him upright. He smashed down ruthlessly on the first Stalker, the enormous force of the "Grief-Iron" turning the creature's chitinous limbs into a spray of black ichor and meat paste.
"MOM! THE... FLOWERS... ARE... BITING... THE... SOLDIERS!" Elio screamed, his voice an enormous piercing of the chaos as he watched the pink silk-webs begin to wrap around the corpses in the plaza, turning them into flesh and blood puppets.
Vane rose from the mud, his eyeballs popped out from the internal pressure of his rage. He didn't have his forge-hammer, so he used a jagged shard of "Grief-Iron" he had just pulled from the Marrow-Mill. He slammed mercilessly into the swarm, his translucent brass fists wreaking havoc on the Stalkers' internal frames.
"IS THIS THE CLIMAX?" Vane screamed, laughing malevolently.
He was unhindered by the "Pleasure-Needles" that bombarded his chest. He racked his brains to find the most "Ugly" way to hit. He grabbed a Stalker by its multiple rib-cages and peeled the skin ruthlessly off its conceptual frame, revealing the blood river of stolen nectar beneath.
"YOU... WANT... TO... LOVE... US... TO... DEATH?" Vane shrieked, his gaze blood red.
He smashed them together with enormous force, their skulls exploded, their eyeballs popped out, and they were reduced to dust before they hit the ground. He was intensely struggling, his bones jutting out of his body, but he laughed madly through the massacre.
Daxian finally rose from the throne.
He didn't walk; he wreaked havoc on the space between himself and the enemy. He slammed mercilessly into the center of the Stalker-swarm, his meat-arm stretching out like a necrotic whip to smash apart their "Silk-Lattices."
Every time he hit, the enormous shock sent a spray of gold meat paste across the plaza. He was unhindered by the pain of his own opened flesh. He was a lunatic taking risks, his skull exploded, his gaze so blood red it ignited the turbid air.
"YOU... WANT... TO... BEAUTIFY... THE... VOID?" Daxian roared, his voice an enormous piercing of the super-void. "I'LL... STAIN... YOUR... PERFECTION... WITH... REALITY!"
He grabbed a Stalker's "Heart-Bloom" and smashed it apart until the flesh and blood were reduced to dust. The Stalker perished in a burst of miserable neighing sounds, its "Pleasure" turning back into logic-dust under the weight of Daxian's Ink.
The massacre between the two sides reached the climax.
The blood river in the plaza overflowed with pink ichor and red gore, carrying the corpses of the Stalkers toward the roots of the World-Tree. Daxian was intensely struggling, his bones fractured in many places, his skin opened, his flesh split, but he laughed malevolently.
The Profundity of the Rot-Loom
The slaughter ended when the last Stalker was reduced to dust.
Daxian stood in the center of the plaza, his body filled with injuries. He looked at Vane. The Lord of the Forge was lying in a pool of pink nectar and red blood, his skin opened, his bones jutting out.
"The... Loom... it's... re-weaving... the... meat... Dax..." Vane wheezed, coughing out blood.
Daxian walked toward the wreckage of the Lust-Lattice. He looked at the silk-threads that were trying to sew the shattered bones of the fallen back together into "Beautiful" shapes. He didn't allow it. He slammed mercilessly his own wooden meat-arm into the threads.
The enormous shock of the "Soot-Infection" caused the threads to turn black and brittle. They didn't create beauty; they created Permanence. Daxian began to weave the black silk into the Marrow-Mill, turning the meat paste of the Stalkers into a "Sovereign-Shroud"—a material that could block the "Deletion-Commands" of the remaining Architectures.
The sound was an enormous piercing scream of metal, silk, and bone that vibrated through the very fractured ribs of the city.
Vane crawled toward the Rot-Loom, his unrivaled spirit flaring. He took a piece of the black silk and began to wrap his own jutting bone.
SHHHT. SHHHT. SHHHT.
The sound was the stitching of the New Abyss. They weren't forging weapons of "Light." They were forging weapons of Grief. They were turning the massacre and the soot into a material that the universe could never "Heal."
Daxian sat back on the Throne of the Remainder, his bones jutting out with every breath. He looked at the survivors. They were no longer "Errors." They were "Scars." They were the unrivaled spirit of a world that had died a thousand times and finally decided to wear its wounds as armor.
"The... beauty... is... Gore," Daxian whispered, a smile of disdain on his face.
The World-Tree began to grow once more, its branches heavy with the Soot of the Unrivaled Spirit, casting a shadow of meat paste across the horizon.
The Descent of the Un-Woven Architect
As the violet sun dipped below the horizon, a new frequency began to hum within the turbid air. It wasn't the Lust-Lattice, and it wasn't the Logic-Ghosts. It was something older. Something "Un-Woven."
From the shadows of the Deep Pit, a figure emerged. It looked like Daxian, but its flesh and blood were made of "Pure-Script." It was the Living-Archive—the shadow of the Tenth Architecture that had stolen Daxian's "Initial-Code."
"YOU... ARE... NOT... THE... ONLY... WEAVER," the Shadow spoke, its voice an enormous piercing of Daxian's mind.
Daxian gritted his teeth, his blood red eyes igniting.
"THEN... I'LL... HAVE... TO... SLAUGHTER... THE... PAGE... YOU... WERE... WRITTEN... ON!"
The massacre had only just begun. The Sovereign of the Scrap leaned forward, his shattered bones clicking like the gears of a god-killer.