Chapter 45: A Veil of White

My eyes slowly blinked open, greeted by a surreal and disorienting sight—a world shrouded in a white, snowy haze, blurred by a relentless snowstorm. The frigid, unrelenting wind lashed against my face, each gust akin to a thousand needles pricking my skin. 

Or so I surmised, for amid this elemental tempest, I remained motionless, untouched by the biting cold.

'What is this?' I wondered, my thoughts my sole companions in this desolate place, barely audible amidst the furious symphony of nature. It was a sensation both peculiar and beyond description, defying any attempt to fit it into the realm of the known.

The tempest raged on, its ferocious winds slicing through the air like whispered blades, bearing their secrets into the heart of the storm. I continued to gaze ahead, my vision remarkably able to pierce the swirling maelstrom of snowflakes, unveiling an infinite, snow-covered wilderness stretching as far as my eyes could discern—an untouched, desolate realm.

'Where am i?' The question lingered in my mind, an enigma void of a definite answer. My only possession was my thoughts, adrift in this surreal moment. Desperation compelled me to will my body to move, to turn my head, or even shift my gaze, yet the neural signals from my mind proved futile, unable to break the mysterious shackles immobilizing my limbs.

In this frozen solitude, a chilling realization descended upon me—beyond sight, my other senses lay severed. Paradoxically, they existed in a disjointed, ethereal state, detached from my physical self.

I couldn't move or speak and just stood in place.

'Could this be a dream?' I contemplated, a rational thought amidst the enigma. Such a conclusion should have felt odd, but it oddly fit the surreal circumstances.

 What truly eluded explanation was the event itself.

My consciousness stood solitary, seemingly disconnected from my corporeal form, adrift in an ethereal plane. I recalled reading about similar phenomena—an Astral Projection.

 But was this genuinely an out-of-body experience? Doubt gnawed at me. Astral Projection usually involved observing one's body from an external perspective, yet I could perceive only what my body did from a single, unchanging viewpoint.

So, was it a dream, an Astral Projection, or something entirely different? The answer remained elusive, leaving me suspended in the hushed turmoil of this enigmatic world.

As I contemplated, lost in contemplation of my predicament, a low, eerie voice, akin to a cacophony of hisses, drifted on the biting wind. The voice called out, demanding my recognition and attention, uttering but one phrase:

"My Liege."

The words hung in the frigid air as my body remained still. Then, for the first time, my gaze shifted, and my body turned towards the source of the voice. I peered over my shoulder, my eyes meeting a shadowy mass of haze just behind me.

'What is that?' I wondered, suppressing the urge to shudder.

The figure appeared as a mass of shadowy haze, resembling an eerie cloak of darkness that sharply contrasted with the white veil of the snowstorm shrouding the plain. 

The inky edges licked at the cold air, permeating it. An instinctive urge to recoil surged within me, but, as before, my mind and body occupied separate realms.

The mass of shadowy haze flickered, revealing a distinctive outline of a hunched humanoid figure beneath the shroud.

'It's...a person?' Upon closer inspection, the likely humanoid figure, concealed within a black shadowy miasma, remained bowed over, one leg anchored in the snowy terrain, and its head lowered in a respectful bow.

"Spawn," I uttered, the words resonating with an enchanting aura of mystery and allure. Their depth was palpable, evoking an otherworldly detachment from rationality and reality, their essence exuding immeasurable potency.

'Is this how I always sound to others?'' I wondered, impressed.

The shadowy miasma flickered, its tendrils brushing the blizzard air like serpentine tongues.

"This humble one has come to report the confirmation of the total annihilation of the Northern Colony..." the shadowy spawn spoke, and something stirred deep within me as I listened. In the next moment, the darkness forming the undulating miasma trembled under an inexplicable dominance.

I believe I was angry.

"My Liege!" the shadow spawn called out in a plea, the bent figure prostrating itself against the ground. The black miasma surrounding it continued to wriggle and tremble uncontrollably, flickering.

Then I spoke once more, my voice like the undulating surface wave of an ocean, concealing unknown mysteries and authority in its depths. This time, my voice carried a hint of sternness and anger, resonating with a deep bellow.

"Spawn," I declared, the black miasma continuing to flicker under the weight of my words. 

"Do you doubt me?" It was a question, a simple question, yet even I felt the weight behind each word. One misstep could mean not just death but erasure.

The black spawn hesitated for a brief second, its hushed voice resembling a cacophony of hisses as it stammered in response.

"...S—surely not, Sire! I...It seems I have acted unnecessarily. D-Do forgive this humble one's transgressions!"

In response, my forehead creased into a scowl, and my gaze shifted away from the perturbed mass of haze trembling before me. 

I stared into the blurred distance, the sharp winds of the blizzard whispering past my ears like blades, while from behind, I could hear the relentless flapping of my coat amidst the wild, howling cries of the storm.

"It's a nuisance," I muttered, my scowl deepening.

 In the next instant, a powerful surge of pressure erupted from within me, dispersing the howling blizzard wind and abruptly quelling the storm. The snowy mounds beneath my feet and the plain vanished as if blown away by a gust, leaving no trace behind.

I remained baffled, a mix of threatened and awestruck. In a mere second, every trace of the blizzard had vanished, not a single snowflake remained in the air or on the ground. The hard, barren earth lay exposed, devoid of snow.

I could still sense the presence of the Spawn behind me, its black miasma emitting an unsettling aura.

"It's all a nuisance, every bit of it," I declared, my words imbued with an inexplicable hatred and a palpable bloodlust.

I turned around once more, my gaze shifting toward another direction—the one immediately before me.

'What... Th-this is...!'

It was a colossal chasm. No, it was an immense crater, its depths unfathomable, brimming with molten lava. Despite being just a half step away, I had failed to notice it through the snowy veil cast by the biting blizzard.

The size of this crater defied belief, and it was even harder to comprehend when gazing directly at it. Its width spanned several miles, extending as far as the eye could see. Its depth exceeded a few hundred feet, the bottom simmering with crimson, molten lava.

"Spawn," I called out to the creature bowing behind me, detecting a strange hint of somberness and detachment in my voice as I continued

"Wouldn't you agree... everything it should all vanish, this creation of theirs," I stated, my scowl deepening as I redirected my gaze toward the clear sky.

"If it aligns with my Liege's wishes, then so it shall be. Who would dare to oppose?" the spawn replied, his words laden with an implicit threat that accompanied his final statement. Simultaneously, the spawn shifted, reacting to a different presence, and let out a menacing growl directed at the heavens.

"Perhaps. But it seems he disagrees," I mused.

Before I could fully register the situation, a streak blazed through the sky, descending with a thunderous crash some distance away from where I stood.

BOOM*

The impact was nothing short of formidable, sending billowing clouds of dust skyward as the desolate ground birthed a new crater, from within, I spotted the vague humanoid outline.

"@##@#$#!!!" With a fierce, almost primal cry that failed to register in my head, a mysterious figure tore through the thick veil of dust, hurtling across the expanse like a bullet, closing the distance between us at a startling pace.

My senses struggled to keep up, and the last thing I perceived was a blinding flash of light— the kind from a blade.