[Kassius V, Highguard Sector]
The charred corpse lay on the shore of the molten caldera, motionless, as if speaking that single word had drained it of all energy. But that was a misconception. Rather than being drained, all it had done was to concentrate that wrathful fury into a sublimated form that permeated his body, not a single drop leaking outwards, thereby giving the impression of a corpse.
After an unknown time passed, a finger twitched. And then the arm. And then, its eyes opened once more. Golden pupils that burned with wrath surveying the hellish landscape all around. Slowly, it began to stand. Every motion cracked open its charred skin, leaking plasma and blood that rapidly boiled away under the heat.
A thousand of these cuts all over his body, but the figure paid them no heed. Pain was not an obstacle, a singular obsession in his mind so large that it left room for naught else.
Every single moment he had lain there, he had thought only of that. He could only think of that, for in his world, nothing else could even be fathomed to exist.
REVENGE!
And so he stood, bathed in radiation from the screaming pulsar above, soaked in magma, in an atmosphere pressurised enough to squash a battleship into a flat circle. Under the weight of the heavens, he stood unyielding and firm like a pillar of charcoal.
But that was not enough. With laborious slowness, he took a single step. His slow regeneration, though not overt, was miraculous in nature. But it brought with it its own problems.
Each step send an excruciating amount of pain coursing through his renewed nerve-endings. Enough that even he had to pause for a second, breathing deeply with bloodshot eyes.
For a moment, a true realisation of his state assaulted him. The first step of an uncountable number and he would have to somehow escape off this planet. Alone, stranded, would it not be better to give in? To finally be free of pain?
What was it even like, to be without pain? That he had ever lived such a life felt so foreign to him, in that moment.
Such weakness cannot hold me. I am the true Scourge of the stars.
And so he took another step. And another. And another.
Each one accompanied by enough pain to make a lesser man curl up and cry, but the charred corpse continued onwards unfazed. Reaching the top of the caldera, with a final push, he stood upon the ledge, overlooking the world, the true prison, he had been confined to.
The volcano he emerged from was simply one of many, a range of them arranged in a line until the horizon. Not all were active, but most were in the midst of exhaling black, ominous clouds of gasses into the sky. Rivulets of molten diamond covered the land, a criss-crossing pattern of veins that promised only annihilation.
Stolen story; please report.
The figure split open his mouth as if to address the world.
"...Harken..."
The word was soft, weak. It was nothing.
: : GOD'S HEART : :
Those terrible syllables echoed abhorrently and for a few moments, all was silent. The world itself seemed to hold its breath.
Abruptly, a beam of pure light fell from the sky, landing on the charred figure. Blindingly bright, for a split second, it outshone even the radiant pulsar in the sky, clearing away the impenetrable atmosphere and revealing the starry sky.
It continued for several seconds, as if Heaven itself was illuminating the mortal world below in scorching intensity. The ground beneath it began to heat up, the molten diamond magma beginning to evaporate away. After what felt like an eternity, it began to fade, sputtering out and returning the planet to a comparative darkness.
What was revealed was something at first sight was no different from the charred corpse.
Except now, where it was the black of soot, it was as if the velvet night sky coated the figure's skin. Obsidian and smooth, inlaid with twinkling gems like stars.
At the centre of its forehead, a star shone that was brighter than the rest, like a sun. Pure white, holy. The figure was a sharp contrast from before, akin to a god in the flesh.
Any impression of benevolence was immediately exterminated by the words it spoke. In a deep voice, nothing like the hoarse approximation it had before. In the voice of deep space, of the void between stars, it spoke.
"In exchange for all that I have...all the Suns that burn within me."
His voice warped with malignant madness.
"VENGEANCE!"
Bringing a hand forward, palm up, a single starry dot of the thousands and thousands covering his ink-black skin began to glow brighter than the others. Growing into a sphere of starlight, it enveloped his figure before shrinking away and disappearing. Leaving behind nothing but the scorched ground and an echoing proclamation of rage bore witness by none save the universe itself.
Perhaps it was a trick of the eye, but it seemed the pulsar in the sky had dimmed slightly, as if it too feared what was about to be unleashed on the unsuspecting galaxy. Ancient things, terrible things, that should have been burned away from the ledgers of history had begun to stir in the dark.
Far from such major events and far from that planet, on the capital system within the Highguard sector, a simple program sent an alert. Very basic, a string of information that alone would not have meant anything if not for the accompanying context.
Unauthorised hyperspace transmission. Single Unit. Kassius V.
It was only of minor note considering the uniqueness of the system and even so, in any other place, a single unit would not have caught any real attention. It was a coincidence that the Highguard were notoriously insular, guarding their hyperspace with a similar fervour as if it were the insides of their very homes. And so this signal was escalated up several increasingly complex programs, eventually reaching an overseer.
"Kassius V, huh? Send out a Shard-Fleet. We'll see what they say."
Even that should have led to nothing of note. Except for another coincidence; the proximity of Kassius V to a certain area of the galaxy of interest to our semi-sluggified friend. Known by several names, but by one in particular.
Outspace.
Just a coincidence, I am sure.
With a silent giggle fading away into the distance, the Shard-Fleet was dispatched on its normal, routine assignment where it would encounter nothing abnormal or out of the ordinary.