86 The Sacrifice (1/2)
A typhoon of destruction had arisen in the pits of hell. Fire and fury had descended upon the infernal landscape on a magnitude unseen since the nightmarish days of the Great Barrier War.
Screams of rage, terror, and despair filled the air as a grisly massacre continued down below. It, for all intents and purposes, looked like a genuine hellscape from the ground level.
The charred corpses of millions of Infested had created an unspeakably toxic stench of death and diseased flesh. Massive rivers of boiling blood gathered into giant lakes of the noxious poison. The crimson sky above had set everything under it aflame — be it flesh, bone, or blood.
Even the barren, empty land of the void had been terraformed in the wake of the fight. The crushed and melted remains of the Infested had even formed a thin veneer — a horrifying glaze of gore — that had the appearance of shining red soil. Charred corpses that had been left piled on top of each other formed blackened mountains of death.
Nothing had been spared.
It was such a disturbing scene of inhumane slaughter that the Devil himself would've been plagued by nightmares about it for the rest of his life…
We're almost there…! There's only a little bit left until we reach the hole!
Lu'um and Reed had made significant progress in their charge toward the hole and had covered a majority of the distance, save for the final kilometer or so. It had gotten much more difficult than when they had initially started — the Infested had started to pour into the void even faster than before to make up for their losses.
They could afford to waste as many Infested as needed. After all, they'd torn apart an untold number of realities.
Entire multiverses worth of fodder had been converted into Infested. It did not matter to them if a million of their slaves had been destroyed.
They would simply pour another million, ten billion, hundred trillion of their slaves into the hole. As many as the situation demanded.
”We're not making any more progress, sweetcheeks! There's too many of them!” said Reed as he hurtled another barrage of meteors down upon the overflowing waves of Infested below them.
The chaotic meteor show did little to advance their cause, though. When two Infested turned to dust, another five seemed to take their place almost immediately. The Infested seemed to have been given new orders from the look of their growing numbers… and that did not bode well for Reed and Lu'um.
”I think that they've caught onto our plan, Ka'an! The Outsiders have stopped playing around — they've probably sent word to all of their forces now! We need to move NOW! We'll likely be overrun in a couple of minutes if we don't close the hole RIGHT NOW!” said Lu'um.
The word 'infinity' alone could not appropriately describe the Grand Swarm. It was much more than that. So much more.
It was an entity made of multiversal despair. All-encompassing and unstoppable, the Grand Swarm was the Outsider's answer to those who would dare to believe in the measly, foolish concept that was Hope.
That they would survive and emerge victorious against them, who had lived longer than their reality was old.
For those who'd confidently put their faith in the 0.001 percent chance that they would prevail.
It was their answer to those who had chosen to ignore the other 99.999 percent of the truth.
Lu'um grit her teeth in frustration and said, ”Get ready to block the entrance with everything you've got!! I'm going to clear the way!”
”How are you goin—”
Reed was quickly dragged off of his serpent by Lu'um and then pushed behind her. She gathered a frightening amount of Anima and then compressed them into two motes of pulsating light.
”Cover your eyes and wait for my signal, Ka'an!”
Lu'um gazed at the two serpents with an expression of sorrow on her face but knew it had to be done. She released the motes and the serpents ate them in response, aware of the fate awaited them.
They did not mind. It was an honor for them. They would gladly fulfill their duty and join their kin on the other side.
The serpents hissed in pain as their bodies struggled to hold the power that they had been given. They would not be able to hold out for much longer, but it did not matter to them as long they could clear the path for their masters.
The feathered serpents, Lulu and Rara, gazed at their respective masters one last time.