The Resurrection

Semi-canon of the Scythe saga.

The dozens of screaming, shattered souls entombed within the abyssal depths of whatever realm the gems from the Crown lead to, have been wailing in unending agony for many, many years now. A disaster that was quite unexpected - a disaster that would not be forgotten any time soon. Yet within those vast reaches - Vorvadoss could hear them. What was left of them. Only ethereal creatures trapped to a doomed existence for aeons to come, left to rot in the antediluvian halls of unreal stone and bone that cobbled the infinite corridors that constituted the terrifying realm that was hidden within the Crown. But one particular soul had screamed a lot. Prayed. Cried. In desperation unlike any that could be described only via words. The pain of a genuinely broken man.

Vorvadoss held the accursed Crown between his skeletal, seven-fingered hands, peering within the abyssal reaches of the gems that not even the light around could afford permeating. Tilting his head a little - and glaring with the five carved eyes of his mask towards it. He thought, in those moments, intensively. He thought of the genuine horrors Eriksvar inflicted - and how he, too, would have to do that, if he desired his freedom again. The maddening whispers of this tool were nothing to someone like him, who had undergone much worse - which ultimately led to him becoming this fiend. It was this way that he soon discovered that the Crown desired the deaths of the remaining Triumvirate members. Theodrasyr. Falkrov. Yrsafgar. All would have to die, and then... And only then... Would Vorvadoss have a chance at becoming free once more.

“Is this really what I have become?”, Vorvadoss quietly thought to himself, “A... Monster, like the others. Perhaps this is a fate that befalls me and many others. But I will not relent. My freedom is my own.”, he reflected. Until one voice in particular managed to reach out to him.

“Hello?! You! The man with the Crown!”, he shouted desperately. Vorvadoss’s gaze fixated on the gem where the voice came from. Not responding, but listening. The voice went on. “Help me! This place is -terrible-! Where has Eriksvar sent us?! This is not where my family is... For the love of-.. Please, let me go! Whoever you are!”

Vorvadoss tilted his head a little. Responding. “And who do you think I am to grant you freedom so easily?...”

“I don’t know! Whoever you are... I will do -anything- if you let me out of this place! I just want to return to them...”

The cultist stared blankly, contemplatively. Remaining silent for a minute or so while judging his decision.

“Fine.”, Vorvadoss said a little heavily. “Perhaps I can grant you freedom. Edgar. But in exchange for this, you will have to serve under me... Until I say otherwise. This is the only chance I will offer you, and it is already generous enough to make me reconsider.”

Edgar contemplated. He had no choice. He knew there was likely to be no alternative than this. This was his best shot at freedom...

“I accept.”, he said a little reluctantly.

“Then...” Vorvadoss grasped the frontal gem of the Crown, glaring at it. Green, mystical energies swirled as he made a dragging motion with his hand out of a sudden - ejecting Edgar’s soul - and body - out of the Crown as he flied out, landing on the cold stone floor with a loud thud. “...so it shall be.”

Edgar scrawled and rushed to get back up; he was still very dazzled, the malevolent energy of the Crown still fluctuating around him. The Crown’s gems glowed brightly...

“Do not dare betray me, or the Crown will claim you.”, Vorvadoss threatened, advancing towards him a little.

Edgar couldn’t help but nod, still dazzled and mildly panicked - unaware of this man’s apparel, having assumed he was a normal creature. “Wh-... Who are you??”, he asked a little frightened.

“You will know me as Vorvadoss and nothing more.”, he retorted. The Crown’s ever-brightening gems caught Vorvadoss’s attention, turning his head towards it.

Not long after that, the Crown spoke in a forbidden language, its gems lighting up even more as did Vorvadoss’s fifth eye - on his forehead - both a sickly, neurotic hue of green - the man ‘freezing’ in place as he communed with it. The cultist responded in the same language - the walls quivering and shivering from the foundation with each word he spoke from that language - despite it seemed that Vorvadoss was merely whispering those words. Each word, leaving behind a howling, heart-chilling echo as any light that bathed the broken room through the old rectangular windows behind Edgar, begun dispersing slowly. Edgar cowered a little, back-pedalling in a corner, afraid the ceiling would collapse on him in the already-ruined house they were in. Dust shaking from the wooden ceiling as Vorvadoss kept talking - slowly, carefully, as if aware of the catastrophic damage it would cause when spoken too fast.

The communing ceased. The fifth eye no longer glowed. Turning his attention back to Edgar.

“You have served Maelheart. He has been... Generous to you. But I will not be. You will do what I tell you to do, you will kill whoever I tell you to kill, otherwise, the deal will end.”

Edgar sighed, the weight of this deal already pressing on his shoulders, heavier than he had anticipated while being trapped in the Crown.

“...Alright. My Lord.”, he spoke, still paranoid about the walls falling. “What would you have me do?”

“You are now a part of my Council. The Council of Nine. You will meet up with Richard Godric north of this place. Find him. Do not delay.”, he spoke, stepping away and resting back on the chair that surprisingly fit his three-metre frame - it was whimsical to see Edgar having to look up to talk to Vorvadoss.

“The Gems await.”

Edgar said nothing.. Shuffling towards the door as he opened it - creaking as the sun’s rays pierced through the cracks in it and leaving - closing it shut as ancient dust shook off it.

Author's Note

Hastily written.