139 The Order of the Heated Blade (1/2)

Twenty days after I returned to Torus from the war-torn world of Salifinos I found myself inside the one place I could loosely consider my home: the eerie tower I had long-ago constructed to serve as a strange base of operations.

I was inside of a loosely occupied chamber, accompanied by Ava. We were silently watching a flurry of strange, cult-related activity. There were a number of humans tied to stone slabs, their faces wracked with fear, anxiety, and in a few cases unbecoming anticipations for what was to come. They were entirely naked and were both male and female. They weren't the only occupants of the strange room.

A number of strange creatures, slavish worshipers of mine who worshiped me as in an unsettling way, were running around and preparing for something. The creatures were demons, devils, and pain-bringers, all of whom were evil-extraplanar entities who worshiped me as a powerful god of evil and pain.

Succubi, incubi, humanoid devils, and even some of my newer worshipers, humanlike pain-bringers, were frantically moving about the strange chamber. They were grabbing an assortment of weapons and other tools that could easily cause pain, in preparation for a ritual that I was slowly coming to enjoy.

Over the course of the last few days, the odd extraplanar entities had come together to form something odd: an organic cult dedicated to me. I had summoned all of them myself, but merely to test and familiarize myself with my own powers related to conjugation and alignment. After summoning them, I had largely let them have free roam of my tower. I had been curious to see what they would do if I left them to their own devices. It turned out that their inclinations to obey powerful, evil entities superseded their innate dislike for each other.

The chamber was filled with the sounds of their feet pounding the floor beneath them. And the quieter sound of humans straining against the bounds that left them stuck to the slabs. Each of the humans was carefully tied to the slabs they were on top of. Their hands and legs were bound to the slabs with spider-silk I had created and gifted to the cult days ago.

Ava was beside me. She enthusiastically watched this, her eyes glued to both the bound humans and to the extraplanars who were about to ritualistically maim them. She enjoyed the theatrics of this and came to watch it on a daily basis, even when I wasn't here with her.

The bound victims were a number of humans I had created for the purpose of giving my cult victims on which they could be sadistic without care. I had done this days ago, fully expecting them to kill them the day I created them. Much to my surprise, the decidedly evil cult had kept them alive for days thanks to the leadership of a surprisingly charismatic pain-bringer who was in essence this cult's high-priest. He had managed to convince even the least patient demons in the cult to draw out the suffering of their victims as a tribute to me and what he deemed my ”dark glory”.

The humans themselves were now covered in vicious scars, and in a few cases possessed still-bleeding wounds from days of torture. Their pain was something I had begun to feed on, and a few of them were slowly turning into masochists who legitimately enjoyed the suffering they were forced to endure every day. I fully suspected this was due to my relative proximity and the effects of my multitude of auras, but especially my corruptive, painful, and lustful auras.

A powerful smell filled the air of the chamber. It mixed the scents of sweat, blood, and other bodily fluids into a toxic cocktail of a smell. It would have been nauseating to many mortals, and even Ava was only unaffected by it thanks to a quiet intervention on my part. I kept her from being affected by it, by targeting her with a persistent illusion that only targeted her sense of smell. The smell did nauseate the humans but was fully ignored by the extraplanars.

I watched, silently, as the extraplanars began to enter the final phase of preparation for their dark ritual. Those of them that aided in this phase ran to the far end of the chamber we were in.

This chamber wasn't an especially large or tall one, it was built for creatures of humanoid size, and was only so long. A number of open entrances and exits led in and out of this place, gigantic openings in the marble-like walls that surrounded us. At one end of the chamber was a collection of supplies for the ritual.

Among the collection of supplies were things like blades to cut into foes, scalpels for surgical purposes, and even dark buckets meant to collect drained blood. The extraplanars grabbed these tools and transported them to their allies and fellow cultists.

I watched, mildly entertained, as imps and other devils aided in the efforts to supply their evil-kin with the assorted instruments they had grown accustomed to using during this ritual. In a few minutes, each of the dozens of extraplanar beings was beside a bound human and carrying a sharpened, perpetually heated, but not to the extent that it reduced the suffering their victims underwent, tool meant to mutilate and maim.

Every single extraplanar had a dark grin on their faces as they stared at their victims. The facial expressions of their victims differed from person to person, but some had almost lewd expressions on their faces. It was at this point that their high priest approached me.

The high priest of one of the newest cults devoted to me was a strange individual. He was a pain-knight, a member of a medium-tiered species within the strange hierarchy of races collectively known as the ”Pain-Bringers”. He wore light-blue robes that covered his sickeningly scarred body, and only his thoroughly scarred face was exposed to anyone who laid their eyes on him. He had pale skin, honey-colored eyes, and was bald.

He carried no weapons and was the only member of the cult to make use of his unarmed body to inflict pain. He was also a devoted worshiper of mine who gave me his heart and soul in exchange for power and for chances to inflict pain on anyone who I deemed deserving of either suffering or pleasure, including himself. The man was a sadomasochist, as were many members of his species.

”Master... We present this macabre display to you, in hopes that it pleases you.” The man told me, his voice soft and reverential. He then humbly fell to his knees before me, eager to debase himself if it meant that I was pleased.

When he fell to his knees, the other extraplanar entities in the room rose their blades high above their heads. They then brought their weapons screaming down and into the bodies of the bound humans. Ava grinned as she watched this, enthralled by the violence in front of her.

The humans in the chamber wailed out in agony as their bodies were penetrated by the sickeningly hot weapons. The extraplanars were all incredibly strong, at least relative to their frail victims and the blades they wielded stabbed deep into their victims. Blood splattered the blades, the victims, and in the cases of the strongest extraplanars, shot forth so violently that the perpetrators of the violence were themselves coated in the scarlet fluids.