Chapter 34:

Chapter 34: Lessons in Slaughter come cheaply when you have many Foes.




Princes and princesses are rarely pleasant people to be around if you are not one of their servants for the simple reason that they have no reason to be and they are very busy.

They have to be, for to continue tricking tens of millions of Eldar into serving you is very time consuming and few have any reason to spend that energy on dealing with outsiders which came as a shock when news of Lammor's abdication and the naming of a new heiress spread through the city like wildfire.

The city cheered it and thanked their future princess for tricking the crown from the farseer's brow and I was surprised even if I shouldn't have been.

He's a farseer after all.

"My Lord, what would you have us do?" My two blades asked of me as we left the farseer's city and were accompanied by its cheering masses.

The masses did not know us or think we had anything to do with and yet they still offered us drinks and food to join the revelry before we left the city. We politely declined the offers for I wished to be out of this city as fast as possible.

I could feel that the two wished for revenge for the insult and believed I would try to go around my promises for revenge and to avenge my honor. It was truly touching, but unfortunately I have standards and one of them is that if someone goes above and beyond in repaying or paying me for a favor or to help me then I will do so in turn.

Lammor despite being a farseer had done just that, and because of that I could not do or order anything that would harm him, not because of any oaths I may have made to any gods living or dead, not because of any oaths to my family or organization, but because I have decided that I am an honorable individual and will treat others the way they treat me.

If Lammor would have broken his oaths like farseers normally do I would have hunted him down like an animal, if he tried to weasel his way around the agreement I would have done the same to kill him and if he only did exactly as I asked I would have done exactly what I offered and done nothing to stop myself from killing him or ordering his death once I had what I needed.

Instead of all of that, he offered me more than I asked for and paid upfront and despite my sincerest wishes to the contrary I will do the same and make sure that I do not intervene in any of his schemes on this world, even if I doubt he'll remain a prince on this world for long.

"Nothing my blades, the prince's pettiness is for his people to rectify, if any choose to do so now that he is no longer prince. He has given me what I wished and more so I am willing to ignore any slights provided he does not cause any further ones." I sang to my blades.

I could feel regret swelling in my chest from my words, but I have decided on what sort of life I wish to live and to repay his generosity with treachery is fundamentally against the man I wish to become.

They were dissatisfied with my decision, I could feel it in their song, but I would not budge on this, for I am not a farseer and that is their way and not mine.

"We will go south west to find this princess that needs to die, once she's dead we will meet my wives and your charges, but now I need you to stop thinking on revenge and start thinking about killing Eldar, for that is much more important than revenge."

Those words were followed by a sense of shame from my blades and I decided to nip this issue in the bud.

"Do not apologize for it, if he did not give me more than I asked for, we would be planning how to burn in his city to the ground but I won't repay generosity with death, it is simply not the type of man I am." I ordered.

They did not like my order but they would obey. We started to run south-west.

"Yes, my lord." The two said as one.

"We have faced isolated cultists and idiots before, but now we'll face large groups, so we will need to adapt our fighting style. I will begin showing you how it is done with the first group, afterwards you will help me with the next ones then we'll go in two groups to not waste time. The plan is simple, kill everything we can see that isn't a faithful follower of the Pantheon until we either find the princess or she finds us." I informed them.

It took us two days before we found a large group of Eldar, 100 of them to be more exact.

I looked upon them and was disgusted by what I saw.

The things downhill from us were Eldar in name only. Their faces looked normal, somewhat, they were recognizably eldar but they had so many scars on themselves one could be excused for thinking otherwise. Some were wearing robes, others not even their skins and all of them were unkept and dirty.

The only thing well maintained about themselves were their blades which were sharp. They were quite literally the sorriest bunch of misfits Eldar cultists can be.

"Haven't seen chainswords in a while." I observed.

Chainswords are common in this universe for some reason I do not understand. They can't cut as fast, the teeth can fall from the chain and they need greater sustained muscle power to cut through things and all of that for some mild anti-armor properties. I can understand most species using them but Eldar are better served by just using sharp implements of force weapons rather than chain weapons as they do not fit our fighting style.

Eldar fight with speed and burst attacks in melee and a chainsword is made for sustained damage and effort against very light armor and tougher opponents without it so that the teeth can chew through flesh and while it has its place on the battlefield it is not one I feel comfortable in or that I think fits the melee combat practices of my new people.

"They are not a very popular weapon my lord." Iameas said in an amused tone from the twins female body.

I really need to help find these two some wives or husbands. It's obvious when half a mind speaks and when they do as a whole and I can't immunize them until their minds are healed back into one but thankfully the disease is easily removed in its early stages by those blessed by Khaine and the damage even easier to mend by those of Isha.

I still gave them the smallest Ward of Darkness I could make with ten heartbeats of Grey Wastes. They won't protect them from dedicated corruption or damage enemies and cause them to commit suicide, but they do provide protection against passive attacks.

"Why do the two of you think so?" I asked as I prepared to kill the small horde which spotted us.

"The teeth tend to fall off fast, and the ability to disarm opponents by activating the chain suddenly loses effectiveness against those that know to expect it." Leiam said from the same female body.

They do this all the time, they pick a body to talk and don't even realize they're switching half minds to speak through it. At least it's progress from before when the same half mind would forget which body it should be speaking through and I've had conversations with one of them that switched between bodies without realizing.

"I didn't even think that people actually use it like that, as it sounds like something so easy to counter, but never mind, now I will teach you two how to provide medicine to large groups of people."

Now the horde has close half the distance and I got myself ready to cleanse it from this word.

I have active at any given time 294 Swords of Valor that I can use. I can only use 7 in sword mode where I control each blade individually with skill and grace, or I can shoot and aim all 294 of them in gun mode on full auto.

In sword mode I use my Swords of Valor as I would use telekinetic blades and they are very precise and very satisfying to use but I am a gun-sword and my soul craves to sing in the cadence of gunfire and it has been so long since I've done it.

Unfortunately, my desire for bloodshed will have to temper itself for some more, I had some instructing to do.

"Each individual only has a blade and they're obviously rabble so we will just use 3 lesser attacks in a triangle formation so that no matter what they try they will only be able to block two of the attacks at most."

I could feel I had their full and undivided attention now. Normally they would attack with all blades on a target from so many angles the enemy didn't even know how to defend themselves and it overwhelmed the Maton shield protections. They could use twenty Swords of Valor in sword mode each after a month of light training which I called nonsense on, for I can only use 7 at most and they're more skilled than me as well with them.

But if I were to call nonsense on every single piece Eldar skill my people have no idea how to treasure I'd never stop.

The first thing to die was one of the naked flayed ones for he was the fastest of the bunch.

I fired three swords into him, two near the heart and one to cut his neck. He blocked the ones near his heart and did not realize he was dead as his head hit the grass and his body's momentum was stopped by another blade kept in reserve for this.

Similar scenes repeated 70 times in one heartbeat as the enemies were each hit thrice before being cut into pieces as each time my sword would find flesh they would twist and turn and proceed to start cutting through the flesh of Eldar before the Eldar in question even noticed they were hit.

One heartbeat later only 29 were left, as the chaff of the chaff are now dead and only those in a less unkept look were left. They even had a full set of clothes without holes in it even if they were dirty with mud, blood and other fluids.

"Are the two of you certain you do not like using the ranged mode?" I asked my blades in song.

The more disciplined ones are discussing among themselves now. I do not know if they are discussing who should go first or if they should run but they are still in my range, for my craft are all gun-swords and those can hit from both melee and long range.

"We have tried my lord, but it just does not feel right, it feels like there's always something missing and we apologize for it but we just don't like to subject ourselves to that feeling again." The twins sang as one from the same body.

I could not hide a sigh at that, but nodded.

My blades have talent at using my gun-swords as sword and do so with unparalleled skill, but the gun mode makes them uncomfortable even if they can use it in a pinch.

"I won't force you to integrate it in your way of fighting or demand that you use it to kill, but please learn to use it as it might prove useful to you and you can attack faster with it." I pleaded to the two.

They bowed but did not comment on it. They were scared of the lack of flow in their movements but would obey me for they knew I wished them well with it.

In the meantime the less shitty rabble decided to run and I killed them in an instant as their backs turned, for they were of no more use to me as teaching material now that they no longer wished to close into melee.

"Let's burn the corpses then find another, in the next fight I'll see if I can teach you to handle it when the Maton are nearby to provide shielding assuming the cultists bother."

The two obeyed and started burning them and left the grasslands to burn so that we can start a giant wave of flame to eat the entire princedom, and Pyrokinetic flames loves eating eldar bodies for even in death they have tiny fragments of their soul remaining and those burn fast with the right flame.

I wish I thought of keeping some of them alive so that the flames would spread faster but I will do so to the next groups.

These ones didn't have Maton protection so they died easily. The gun mode is what allows me to bypass said protection easily as I can make five attacks in a heartbeat then cut the fools down before they realized they died.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Our lord told us in the first week of our service to him that he is a medicine peddler by craft, but his trade is apocalypses.

We didn't understand then but we do so now, for we looked at the sixth city we were to burn in three days. It was a port city, an almost living thing of middling size and with perhaps 70.000 living souls in it, but it won't be living or that size for much longer.

Using our lord's medicine for burning is easy thanks to one of his tools called the 'Burning Blades' which do one thing only, they burn all that they touch in all-consuming soul fire. Even we were not spared from its flames as we made it, but our Master taught us how to avoid it for it works the same as being a blessed Whisper of Khaine does.

Give it something else to murder and it will leave you alone, and so we gave it many many Eldar to its green-purplish flames that it devoured with glee and thanks.

Our lord joked, or at least I hope he did, that he wanted to use it for cooking first but it didn't burn hot enough or for long enough so now it helps him cauterize wounds.

This flame has been burning for four days and I do not doubt they still burn where we first started.

"I wasn't expecting for the princess to be so slow to receive us, and I suppose my friend was right, Lammor truly was the most hospitable of all the princes and princesses of this world which considering the fact that the slime is a farseer and his people cheered when he stepped down that is saying something." Our lord said as he drank his mint tea to relax.

The princess was late and we've already burned one quarter of her domain.

"I thought he only meant the clan princes my lord, but it seems the cult princes are worse, for the princess has left us to wait for her presence for three days longer than she should have." I, Leiam said.

'Will we have to burn the entire thing until the coward shows herself?' We thought in irritation before we too sipped from our own tea.

We did not understand why people did not believe our lord when he said that mint tea was very relaxing, for it was and we were drinking some with him and we could feel our worries slowly flowing away with each sip as the flames approached the city that was trying desperately to put them down.

"My lord, how do we stop the flames from burning the entire world? They burn in water too and the cultists do not seem to have realized how to do so." I asked.

We did not want the world to burn down, we still had people to defend that had to live on it.

"Easy enough my blades, my other tool I call the 'Null Blade' can stop it and spread a wave of stillness that will burn out the fire, and I suppose not finding enough souls to keep itself burning to bedrock would do the trick as well, but my blade is much easier to use and I doubt the cultists have the means to stop it, even if it's quite easy once you spot the trick and it can be done without my craft." Our lord told us.

"What is the trick?" We asked.

Our lord's craft always needed some form of trick to best use it or required it in order to function properly and as we would use them to defend his family we should probably know it.

Our Master decided to finish his tea before answering and we could see the flames engulfing the city's defenders.

"The same way you deal with most things that act like Khaine, teach them that they can eat themselves and they'll do so until they die. Now honored guest would you be kind enough to show yourself?" Our master said.

I, Iameas refilled his cup as whoever decided to snoop in to our conversation prepared themselves to say their final words.

"Thank you Iameas." Our master said as I finished pouring.

'I think we finally managed to do the tea as he likes it Leiam!' Iameas said to Leiam.

We were quite happy with this development and cheered in our souls.

A woman came towards us from the part of the forest we prevented from burning as our master wished to give whoever would come meet us an easy and obvious spot they could come from and pretend to be sneaky.

The forest was filled with charms that told us all that walked through it, and the only things that were hard to find in it are probably the minds of cultists, for they don't have a lot of them to go between them and what they do have is very very small.

She had dark purple robes inscribes with floral patterns of black and gold, the favored color palette of those that praise the New Divine. She was bald and her head was covered in inscriptions praising the New Divine and her eyes were turned into a glowing purple from whatever color they used to be before.

"I am Lannea Dega, princess of these lands that you have decided to redecorate without my leave, and I would appreciate if the honored warriors would introduce themselves before I turn their souls into slippers." The princess asked sweetly.

The princess' voice would have worked on others, for the false charm in her voice has lead many to their doom but our master's craft prevented us from being affected.

"No, for you are late and you can go die in shame for it." Our master said and attacked with all of his blades.

The woman turned into a red smear by Swords of Valor before a Burning Blade started eating her soul before it could go back to the gods.

The fires started spreading to the untouched part of the forest.

The city was halfway to burning now and its denizens started to flee into the water. Not that it would save them, for the flames had already spread there even if they could not be seen from the surface.

As people jumped in the water the flames showed themselves and only those with vehicles that could fly and hover above the water managed to escape.

"Well, that's my part of the deal done, time to go meet my lovely wives, they've been delaying their pregnancy for too long and I do not wish to miss the birth of my children." Our Lord said.

The flames stopped burning in twenty heartbeats and when they did so our lord rose from the carpet we placed on the ground. We gathered the Wraithbone tea set and leaves and put them in Leiam's backpack and the carpet in Iameas's backpack and excitedly followed our lord, for we have been awaiting for too long for this tardy princess to come and to die.

We were quite excited to meet the family of our lord we will die to protect, for our new purpose is to do so or die trying.

We ran through fields of burned bedrock and ash.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

My day started as the one before me, for I awoke alone in my bed and started a prayer naked and on my knees in front of the altar of the gods. It was the only proper way to pray after all, for the gods cared not for how you looked or were dressed, unlike petty princes and tyrants.

"I thank you Lileath and Asuryan for giving me the foresight of not dismissing my predecessors words, I thank you for convincing him to share them for free for I would have paid whatever price he demanded for this warning." I finished my prayer in speech.

I had been praying for one hour as I awaited for the reports on the planned evacuation of the people I am now to look over.

A planet has already been selected by my scouts for it is mostly empty of Eldar, and the Webway gate to the East is currently having a Wraithbone road sang by bonesingers towards it in order to help facilitate the evacuation.

It is a breaking of the accord of blades but I do not care for such nonsense anymore, for I am too busy taking my people to safety. The fools that aren't running can do something about it after I'm gone.

Reports from my scouts and the few faithful of the Old Gods that managed to outrun Bessar's Immolation came and told me that he had requested an audience with the princess he is to kill and as she had not appeared in the first day he proceeded to burn her realm to the ground.

He burned a third of it in four days and the pace is accelerating and spreading beyond it, for the soul-flames he created feed on the soul of all they burn and they spread faster the more they do so. Thankfully they burn towards the followers of the New Divine and had stopped at our border for I would be dead already if they didn't.

We tried to put it out with water, with other types of fire, with sand and other psychic abilities and nothing worked and nobody can find a way to kill it except perhaps its creator but I won't try and bother with it anymore, for the scouts have given us an idea of its spreading speed and its acceleration and it will burn this world in two weeks at the current speed of spreading and how fast it is accelerating.

Me and those that wish to follow me will be gone in a week and even if it loses me my status as a princess I will leave this world still, for Lammor was correct and the thing that came for a princely favor a few days ago can kill this world whenever it wishes.

"My princess the fires went out." The head of my guard sang.

"It changes nothing, the evacuation will still happen." I sang.

I proceeded to get dressed in the golden robes of my new station that were fit for me and proceeded to hold court.

"All hail the princess whose farsight is only matched by her wisdom, all hail Iraisa Aiunne!" My court shouted as they knelt before me.

It was the Ritual of the Court, an annoying ritual that I cannot get myself ridden of for a century, as I have inherited my position by the grace of my predecessor and so I must keep to the same rituals for at least a century to honor him.

At least I found a way to get rid of the Ritual of Awakening by simply being awake before it was scheduled to start, even if I can sense the whispers that some will be trying to tire me so, so I am to 'enjoy' it properly.

'Fools the lot of them, but they are my fools now.' I thought in amusement as I sat on my throne.

I looked upon my court and awaited for 99 heartbeats as is tradition and ritual before commanding them to rise.

"Rise and inform me of what nonsense and stupidity I am to deal with today." I ordered in my most bored tone.

The instructions for all the rituals I am to follow were thorough, from what I must do ,to how I must do them and even the emotions I must hold while doing them, and boredom featured heavily in most of them.

They did so and the Captain of The Guardians started first as is ritual. He is my replacement, for that was my role before and hopefully will not shame me for giving him my old position.

"No significant crimes that would require your attention have happened my princess, only celebrations for the start of your reign." The Captain of the Guards said.

He was a bald man dressed in black robes with a single white sword to give the robes of his office any individuality. His face features were soft and his eyes blue and I could not recall his name.

I could not even think his name for in the Court of Lammor people are not people but their positions and I must follow this tradition and the rituals he created for 100 years in order to honor him for being a wise ruler and leaving me to rule over what he had created and left me, for he left me plenty.

He left me a prosperous realm that cheered me before I even finished my final task before ascending to the position of princess, for the realm was among the 8 greatest of this world and it was well positioned, prosperous and truly and deeply loyal and happy that they now served me, and because of that I have no cause to cease the rituals of the man who helped create it.

"Excellent, I would hate to have to think on how to deal with their nonsense." I replied as ritual demanded.

The order was set in that which they would report to me, first the guards, then the farmers and agricultural sectors, then the various trades and last was the army proper.

"Lady of the Gardens and Crops, how goes our preparations?" I asked the very tall woman.

She was a tall woman with blonde hair, and green robes adorned with blue flowers and yellow and blue fruits.

She had nothing noteworthy to report either as her subordinates were testing the world to see which crops we could take with us, and if the world we have picked to evacuate to had any that we could use.

The court went in a proper order and with nothing noteworthy being reported until we reached the reports of the army.

"General of the Blades of Lammor, what foes await my diligence?" I asked the young man.

The old General left with around 1000 other individuals which decided to follow their former prince out of loyalty the rest of his realm did not feel for him when he left. His replacement was his own son that until he proved his incompetence I was stuck with.

The new General still wore the pure white robes of his office. He was a young man, only 100 years old with blue eyes and green hair and harsh features. I had never learned his name, for he has inherited his position and the only time I am told someone's name is when they do something noteworthy and inheritance is not as such even if it is to a position in my court.

"None princess, the flames have stopped, and the Sirens have decided to migrate and leave us in peace as they do so and the Matton ignore them even when ordered not to. The cults and their lands to the South West are ash as far as they eye could see, the faithful Sword Clans to the north and north east have made no moves on our road or seem to opposed our plan, for I have sent scouts to inform them of the fact your highness wishes to evacuate this world. The princes have not yet sent a response but their armies are not moving or preparing to do so according to the reports I received from my scouts." He reported.

I liked the initiative and the fact he decided to preempt enemy action by informing them our lands will be up for the taking if they wait and let us leave.

"And the ones to the south east?" I asked.

"No response from my messengers yet my lady, but their princess is across the sea and the scouts I left to look over her forces this site of the sea do not report any movements from them. The lordships and clans near the Webway gate have merely asked us to destroy the road once we finished evacuating." He continued.

"Marvelous, my foes continue to prove as unimaginative as they are useful and you as capable of following my wishes as is expected." I gave the praise as ritual demanded.

The young man might get to keep his position at this rate, which is a shame for my sister wanted it.

'Hmm, perhaps she could marry him then? Both are still unmarried and it would give her the power she craved if one step removed.'

I left such deliberations for later and I'll see when we're safe if I can't trick the two fools into marrying.

"How many of my people and our warriors will join us on our exodus?" I asked my court.

They compared notes and reports in song and updated the numbers they had given me.

The Captain of the Guardians was elected to speak on their behalf.

"My princess, a little bit more than 7.000.000 are now willing to follow you to a new world at the edge of the Empire, and 80.000 who have dedicated themselves to being your warriors will follow them, the rest wish to stay behind and not leave their homes."

I would lose my title as princess but that is fine as long as my fools continue to live, for I can always get it back.

"More than expected which is good, do we have enough food to feed them on our way to our new home?" I asked.

"Yes my princess, prince Lammor had foreseen this decision before stepping down and had stockpiled enough food to feed your realm for five years as well as the means to move it and had ensured our Bonesingers have memorized and can build small houses and bunk beds for 40 individuals in twenty heartbeats." The Lady of the Gardens and Crops answered.

I was thankful and annoyed in equal measure for the answer and my feeling continued as my court explained how our former prince had prepared for this eventuality years in advance without us even noticing that he ordered us to do so.

I was thankful the preparations for an exodus had already been made and all logistics handled and annoyed that everything had finished being prepared an entire year in advance and in so many pieces nobody could see it until we had started openly planning to do so and the pieces were so obviously laid out.

We had food ready for the road, and crops ready to be planted. We have livestock that can easily be transported, we had transports for our people and our industry and weapons and our enemies and rivals are in no position to even bother us, for the only ones that would bother trying to attack us as we packed up and left are burning and the reason we're leaving is because they're burning too fast to think we stand a chance or have any way to stop it.

Lammor is a farseer and he had foreseen a great doom that approaches, for he said the world will burn in flame and drown in water, and now his words scare us and they scare us to such an extent many of my people are willing to move and he had prepared a way for us to do so safely before we even knew we should leave.

"The foresight of Lammor is unmatched beneath the grace of the Divine on this world and all must thank him and the Divine that it is so." I said as ritual demanded and thanked him honestly deep within my soul.

So did the rest of my court.

We hated the bastard, we hated how he mocked us for our insecurities, how he mocked us for that which he tricked us into doing for his own amusement, we hated him for laughing at our ways and shaming them even as he pretended to follow them, but despite all of that he did his duties as a prince and none could deny that he did so well, for we would escape whatever doom Bessar Agail would bring down upon us and we did so only thanks to him.

We hated and we loved him, for he is a farseer and that's what they bring people down to.