Enlightenment and Entropy

[Okor]

Okor shuffled along the thin precipice, looking out with his one eye across the barren wastes. The crumbling edifice of the Broken Temple loomed over the flat, empty desert. His view was obscured by a blast of abrasive dust, reminding him to continue on. Swirling around the point of the monument were swarms of furies, pathetic excuses for Daemons, seeking the welcoming embrace of mortal flesh and bone, a puppet to manipulate, to extend their limited time in reality.

He risked another glance outwards, keeping his back to the wall, the names scrawled there worn into non-existence by the constant wind. The Ziggurat seemed to stretch endlessly upward, but the Daemons always remained, testing his faith. As he rose the makeshift pick forged from the bone and sinew of those who trod the path before him, driving it into the broken stone ahead of him, he reminisced, thinking back to his earlier trek...

7 Hours Earlier, The Bone Desert

Okor plodded across the field of bones, crunching them under his armoured feet. He took a moment to breathe in the heady aroma of powdered bone, gazing out across the land of death. He continued on, ramshackle carts laying in ruin, surrounded by the remains of those who proved wanting. His eye, dripping pus, spotted movement on the Horizon. Some of them were strong enough to live, yet weak enough to die. He drew his blade as they advanced towards each other. A mob of the faithless, their skin dried and stretched across weak bones, eyes rubbed raw by the endless storms wracking the planet. They shambled forth as their legs disintegrated, their hunger and rage driving them forward when their dessicated flesh failed. They were clad in trinkets and rags, indicating their previous existence as pilgrims, and their maddened fury indicated their current existence as another test.

One threw itself upon his pauldron, clawing and biting at the flesh-fused ceramite. Chuckling at this display, Okor skewered the wretch, watching it scream once more as it faded into dust. Raising his bare arm, a Faithless surged towards it, screeching, already salivating at the prospect of a meal. In its hunger, it had neglected to factor in the blade completing its descent. As the blade cleaved through its neck, it transformed into dust, holding its form for a split second as it was swept away by the wind. He rammed his fist through an approaching creature, taking a moment to savour its disintegration, a wave of dust spreading through his body from its abdomen. The final Faithless flung itself towards his stomach, screeching as it met only fused bone, shattered talons scrabbling against the irregular mass. Okor grabbed it by the neck, and raised it to his helmed face. Its eyes gazed vacantly ahead, the corneas ripped away by the dust storms, leaving only raw, red orbs. His own eye gazed into it, judging it, and finding it wanting.

"Such a gift you have been given." His voice was like coffin lids slamming shut, a grim finality that could not be escaped. "You were given, life, power, gifts. And you let them break you." The creature moved its maw, broken and rotten teeth dripping with slime, attempting to bite at the flesh beneath his power armour. "From dust to dust. From filth to filth. From life to death." He powered his head into the creature's skull, the force snapping its neck, shattering its braincase, causing it to blow apart into a cloud of dust, coating Okor's face in a grey powder. Wiping the mess from his eye, he looked towards the path ahead, gazing at the bones that substituted for sand.

14 Hours earlier, the town of Pusula
Okor hunched himself over in the septic tank as the warp-spawned winds ravaged the surface. Filth brought itself up to his chest, staining his armour. He laughed heartily, reveling in the presence of those sharing the shelter with him. It was a gurgling laugh, one that suggested things worse than phlegm clung to his lungs. "Tell me again Aarkos, how you escaped the hulk." His cyclopean gaze was focused on a man on the other side of the tank, whose flesh was sloughing off, revealing a variety of open sores, which were frequently immersed in the filth of the tank. He had no doubt that underneath this filth, the man had a distended gut, a sure sign of Nurgle's favour. The man spoke, his voice struggling to escape mucous, phlegm, and blood.

"So there I was, sheltering inside a heap of eviscerated corpses. The Genestealers were stalking the halls, and I had all of 5 shots left in my laspistol. I was thinking how I could possibly live, but then I remembered that Nurgle always provides. I just focused my gifts, and walked forward." The man chuckled, his laugh echoing strangely. Reality bled around the man, a side effect of his sorcerous power. After a moment, he found the strength to spoke again. "They turned to what they came from when they approached, carapaces turning to primordial soup. The Hive makes them deadly, but there is no thing in existence that can stave off his gifts. Have faith, and burn with the desire to live. Nurgle wants nothing more from his good children." All around the septic tank men gurgled their agreement, reveling in this simple truth.

Now, The Broken Temple
Okor clambered atop the ledge, scanning the names scrawled into the chipped and broken stone. Someone here had tried to preserve the universe in stone, trying to stave off eternal entropy. He picked up a chunk of stone, looking over it in his hands as the furies screeched, circling the peak of the ziggurat. So much for that. He gently replaced the broken piece of stone, and pressed forward along the ledge, shielding his eye from the onslaught on the wind. In the distance, warp-lightning crackled in the dust storms, promising another infernal tempest. He would have to move quickly, if he wished to exist in any form save a pile of rotting sludge. He quickened his pace, eagerly running his eye along the whisper-thin writings on the wall and floor, searching for his own name. Ahead laid a stone, broken from the wall. Kneeling to pick it up, he looked it over, a grin blossoming on his face. Ok-

Then, there was light.

[Okor]

Now, Omni's Lair

Okor was held in stasis, surrounded by a white void. His rotting limbs flailed at nothingness, his boots scrambling for purchase on the sky, finding nothing but emptiness. It took time for him to realize there was little impact he could make. Pausing from his desperate attempts to secure solid footing, he scanned his surroundings with his lone, bloody eye. Sitting in front of him was a Daemon unlike he had seen. Its alabaster skin and manic grin suggested the patronage of the Princeling, but the sheer lack of stimulus suggested otherwise. The fact that his altered skull was still attached to his head ruled out the Lord of Blood. That left only the Deceiver. But how had it taken me from the most sacred of Nurgle's sites? Its maw, the only feature in its face opened, and began to speak.

My name is Omni. This is not the world you know. This is the Omniverse. You interest me, so I have made you part of it. The Omniverse is a place that reflects the wishes of those who are part of it. But! There are rules. I will explain them only once, so listen carefully.

The Daemon extended a hand. To describe its colour would be an injustice to the senses. The being was more of a sheer blank space than anything that could ever be real. From its palm sprung a scintillating sphere, containing an iridescent energy, constantly shifting, changing, never settling into something the eye could pin down.

This is Omnilium. It’s what ties the Omniverse together. Without it, you are nothing. With it, anything you desire can be yours. But you will need more than this. If you desire it enough, you will find it. You will find that using it comes naturally. Just think of what you desire most.

The sphere shot forward, melding into Okor's stomach, slipping through the scars and pores, seeping past the jagged and malformed ribs guarding his diseased entrails, suffusing his very being with energy. Cursing, Okor writhed, his arms held at his sides by power beyond his reckoning. As the shifting substance saturated him, he gazed once more at the Daemon.

You will not be alone in the Omniverse. There are others. Of course, they, too desire Omnilium. Do not fear death. For as long as you interest me, you will be reborn.

The thought of this immortality shocked him. Reality was always in decay. It was inescapable. The only reason he and his kin had persevered throughout the millennia was their dedication. They rotted, and brought Entropy to those who would seek to escape it. In the end, even they would fall into the simple sludge from which all life sprang from. And then, they would be reborn. This was an affront to all he had fought for over his ten thousand years of life.

That’s all you need to know right now. You’ll figure out the rest soon enough. I’ll be watching … and waiting.

The world disappeared in a flash of radiant light.

Now, the Nexus
Okor groggily opened his eye, pushing himself off of the blank ground. A constant rushing noise stemmed from behind him, prompting him to turn around. An hourglass, bound in silver and gold stood before him, the infinitesimally small grains of sand falling upwards, locked in a constant cycle of creation. Why create when it will never decay? Raising his rotted blade, he crashed the pommel down on the fragile glass. The rusted iron rebounded from the device, leaving only a few flakes of rust to show the effort he had made. Cursing, he turned, looking over the empty land around him. Looking at the constantly changing colours coalescing into his palm, he spoke aloud a single thought.

"This must rot."