Over the south polar icepack skimmed an annelid of unusual construction, and on the back of this annelid was an individual even stranger.

His journey had an effective starting point of 'nowhere in particular' and a destination that boiled down to 'over there', but this didn't bother him at all. In fact, the directions had been given with him in mind. He found the landscape inspiring and easy to traverse, and had even taken the time to stop and build a snowman, insofar as 'man' could be applied.

Before long, the journeyman and his steed came into view of the plateau. Magnifique! Their size was indescribable, quite beyond anything he had seen before, and at first he slowed his passage to savour the sensation. Soon enough he realised that not even this was necessary, as the expanse still before him was so vast that he could set his pace however he liked for days yet before his destination was reached. So he urged the modified wyrm onwards, one eye ever on the glorious sight of the stone landscape, the other... Well, there wasn't any other.

If there had been, though, it would be set in the same direction as the rider's recently acquired magnetosensory neurons were guiding him. This planet had an admirable magnetic field, and though the heavily furred, wingless fae he brought with him would throw off any kind of compass they got near, the journeyman took care not to lose sight of it. His destination was maybe a day's journey from its terminal point.

In a few dozen hours, day and night having no meaning here where the summer sun never set, that destination was all too visible. His annelid steed slid flexibly over glacial crevasses and between boulders when the going was rough, until- Oh! That unmistakable shape in the stone! Those structures nestled at its base! The travelling had come to a satisfying end, and the journeyman was made as a speck of dust in the awesome shadow of the World Mountain.

Wow. Glorious.

With an encouraging slap at the side of the wyrm, he descended to the door of the Citadel Dundee.

[center][img]http://66.media.tumblr.com/402cf15221e1f9c6bac10732dd4537fc/tumblr_o8rjgeiPvk1u5gf80o3_1280.png[/img]
[img]http://i.cubeupload.com/4f9Fpf.png[/img][/center]

Although he had been told at length about the still-resonant effects of Vowzra's curse upon the mortals of Galbar, the dwarves had quite obviously been made well after its casting, and they did not react to the journeyman's presence much more negatively than would be expected from those who had never seen something remotely so foreign. He waved at them, having been told that this was a friendly gesture.

This is what they saw.

Over the gravel moved a leechlike, segmented wyrm as black as being buried alive, under whose skin still blacker colours whorled. It was easily twenty metres long and about two across, and it made almost no sound as it moved. Atop it stood a fleshshaper whose characteristic black-and-red patterns had been claimed by albinism, leaving white speckled with pink.

He had a tail and two legs roughly where  they were meant to be, and a fairly ordinary child-sized torso, but for the fact that his arms were missing. These were replaced by two more legs on the front of his chest and a second tail at the top of his spine. All six of his limbs were identical- Thin, beak-tipped tentacles three metres long, with occasional kinks suggesting joints and bones where there were none. All pink and white.

His head was gone too. Where it should be hovered a large black eye-shape, suspended on faint blurs of energy, its pupil a dark blue slit in a wavering white ring. Around his torso hung belts of faintly pulsing tools, bladder and vein and chitin, the largest on his back like a spear.

The three dwarves standing watch at the smaller entrance within the vast stone gate watched this figure move unmistakably towards them through the largely abandoned outer settlement, and, being trained but not tested, immediately sent one of their number to put the Citadel into a state of alert. Then they shared a glance, gripped bronze spears, and simultaneously took a swig of distilled courage.

"Hello," said the newcomer, his eye locking onto one of the dwarves and hovering motionless. The voice was small and shy.

"..."

"My name's Zyle." Long pause. "I'd like to be let in, please." Immediately a 'hand' shot up from somewhere and waved again, tongue wriggling from its beak.

"...Well ah," said the dwarf being stared at from somewhere under his accent, and his beard. "'Spose that can be arranged."

"Oh, that's very good. Now, please." The tentacles wiggled and the torso seemed to nod, but the eye never moved, nor did Zyle dismount.

"Yer armed," said the other dwarf abruptly, gesturing with her spear. "Take them..." Another gesture. "...Things orf, then ye might just get in a wee bit sooner."

"Sorry, no," said Zyle without looking at her. She scoffed.

"Well you'cn bloody freeze yer tit-beaks orf then, we're not lettin' ye in 'til ye put those down 'nd get orf that fockin' big intestine ye got there," said the second dwarf again, pointing as if it was necessary.

"Not happening and I really am really sorry," continued Zyle, flopping a little and then bowing, leaving the floating eye behind until he rose. "Sorry, but I'm going in now. I hope this doesn't make things awkward between us and goodbye." Zyle tapped the oversized wyrm and it started to squeeze into the tunnel, forcing past the gate. 

The first dwarf lunged. Zyle's arm curled inwards then whipped out, pushing the tip of a shell-like shiv into the base of his neck. A shocking [i]bang.[/i]

A chamber of liquid air spat into the dwarf's muscle and expanded in the heat, shattering his upper chest and neck and tossing the snap-frozen body to the ground, nearly decapitated. The massive eye finally turned to lock onto the second dwarf.

"I have five more of those," said Zyle in slight awe, possibly to himself. He let the spent bioweapon fall to the ground. "I'm sorry. Was that distressing? I think it would be maybe best if you escort me in personally. That way you can tell people I don't mean any harm. Is that okay? I'm looking for a resident deity, if there is one."

It had happened in the blink of an eye, too fast for the second dwarf to fully register. She nodded, swallowed, and gestured in. Zyle followed, dismounting somehow after he and the wyrm had squeezed in, spiralling as he moved as if his six arms were an irregular wheel around him.

"You must know. I really am very excited to be here. It was a real stroke of luck. Our lord mutilation can't go in because she's too scared. She's always scared. We know. The Tauga project isn't done yet so that can't happen either. Sending Help would be perfect but Heartworm avoids them. So I'm next in line. See, I have this thing that I love. I matured in the laboratory, before that I came from nowhere much. So I've never had the chance to really talk to anyone who wasn't weird. I love it though. I love chat. Conveying meaning and intention through words in the context of culture. I hope I can get better at it. It's so much fun. Say, have you ever..."

The shaken warrior led Zyle further in. His stare never wavered, not by an inch. Quickly they reached the main hall, the preceding passageway short and sweet. Within, tainted by the sickly sweet smell of copious amounts of ethanol, was a long, central set of tables. They had stools all around them. Many dwarves were in the room, each one with a mug of booze in their hands. The room, initially, was cheerful. Boasting, bragging, and the occasional impromptu song echoing through the truly massive room.

That changed when they spotted the sculptor. The room gradually began to silence as the alert from the guard that had been sent in spread. The citadel guards had already been levied, blocking Zyle’s way with bronze spears and yielding an 'oh dear'. Silence spread across the room, only scant echoes remaining where there used to be merriment and joy.

One dwarf in particular stepped up, clad in fancier clothes than the others. “Ye’on’ o’ those things we was told ‘bout? Scepter ‘r something,” the dwarf mused, a small fragment of divine power radiating off of him. The lightly armored citadel guard behind him nervously held their spears at the ready.

They expectantly awaited the Sculptor’s answer.

"That's an interesting question we should really look into some time," said Zyle eventually. "I mean, there's certainly room for interpretation there. I'll get back to you. Can we please come through now? I'm looking for a deity." 

The eye revolved and settled on the psyker as one of Zyle's beaks gripped the closest haft and pushed it slightly aside, another twitching around the thing on his back. "Maybe you could give me directions?" The dwarf from outside nodded sharply, making grave gestures.

The psyker simply shook his head. "Y'ain't jus' walkin' in'o' th' Empress. Especially nyrt as a stranger." the other citadel guards continued to remain on alert, nervously looking over the Sculptor. The drinking hall was also still silent, the vast tables filled with dwarves that all did not speak, except in whispers. On the tables were their mugs, and what appeared to be some kind of meat and mushrooms on plate. The meat was likely from somewhere in the caves.

There was tension. The wyrm bulged.

"Okay," said Zyle, pulled the rifle-like weapon from his shoulder, and tossed it into the arms of the nearest dwarf. "I've reconsidered. Please make me less of a stranger." Immediately one of his beaks splashed into a tankard and siphoned up the liquor in a gulp, the long arm bulging as it swallowed. Zyle clambered fluidly over a stunned dwarf, picked up a stuffed roast from the table that probably weighed more than him, teetered, and tossed it into the wyrm's...

"Ye gods, that is a lot of teeth," muttered someone. Zyle wiggled. The wyrm's front end inverted and went back to being a featureless snoot.

"Feasting is a custom. Right? Now we are acquainted, and oh, what was that roast, anyway?"

"That was cave spoider meat, and even if y' did give up yer weapons, non'o'us are allowed in th' Empress' chamber, what makes ye think ye will be?" the psyker questioned. The citadel guard fanned out across the room, spears more relaxed now, except when looking towards the wyrm. Some more psykers began to cross the long, cavernous hall.

Zyle shrugged. The motion carried down his arms in waves. "Does she get reports? I can yell at her through the door if I need to. Oh and also I can read and write because Help taught me. Do you have writing? Pictograms maybe? Nevermind. I'm okay with just getting close or listening to her holy voice penetrate my bones until my hollow spaces reverberate in time with the song of the void. Or whatever she does. I'm sure she's lonely." 

"Unless ye' got express permission from 'er, ye ain't goin' in. That's final." the psyker responded as the other psykers continued to near. They eventually made their way up, maintaining a respectful distance from the sculptor. They paused a bit, one of them saying, "Tha' thing can go in. Make i' snappy." the psyker then pointed to an unassuming side door far down the main hall.

"Okay, down the suspicious darkened tunnel I go," commented Zyle, surreptitiously pulling along the dwarf he'd handed his contraption to by the wrist. "Is it a cultural norm to surround visitors with ominous onlookers in nice clothes? I feel like that's important." He gestured, and the giant wyrm began to slide into the doorway. "Let's go!"

The psyker looked as though he was about to say something, but clearly deciding against it, he shrugged his shoulders. They were unopposed in their entrance to the side hall, which quickly fanned out into a larger room. At the center, leaning against a wooden table, was Lazarus. Her form wavered in the air, almost like heat waves on a hot day.

"Are you here for Jvan? No. Someone else?"

"You were right the first time, actually, in manner of speaking," said Zyle, a little idly, as the eye rotated mechanically towards Lazarus. He guided the wyrm into a corner, which it occupied like a shroud. "The psychological fragmentation of All-Beauty is really interesting to follow. Did you know that the uber-mind actually [i]lost[/i] traits when it created the primary probe, even after the connection disintegrated? Also, I'm looking for an Empress," he added, "do you know her?"

"I'm fully aware," Lazarus responded, before continuing. "I'm the Empress." she continued to lean on the table, giving a small glance to the wyrm. "Now, as I was asking, what did you want?" She asked, continuing to waver in the air.

Zyle shuffled, a little tensely, then a belated "Oh!".

"My name is Zyle, an emissary of the Emaciator," he began, "rogue avatar of Jvan. Recently a divine signal was broadcast from the surface of the moon Periditus. By the time we could investigate, the source was already gone. We think it started here." A shift that might've been a nod. "The civilisation growing here hasn't gone unnoticed. I'm here by the word of Heartworm, to establish contact as her proxy."

"The signal did indeed start here. I'm not eager to tell you what it was, however. After all, I am the demigod of secrets," Lazarus paused, "welcome to my little hole in the ground. The dwarves have proved industrious. The only problem is the caste mixing that happens. They can't help themselves."

"That's kind of adorable," said Zyle. "An inter-caste love story. Okay, I'm done here. Demigod identified, welcome received, Heartworm will see you now or soon maybe."

"Just let me know when Heartworm arrives," came the simple response.

There was a single tapping sound.

Dwarf eyes turned to where Heartworm was calmly setting its hoof back down on the stone. Zyle's eye snapped back to the shape of his god- Two slender legs, a pod studded with eyes, and a grey visor thereon. Heartworm didn't tower so much as suspend itself at the top of its limbs as if they were stilts. Stilts corded with hydraulic ducts, and fingertip syringes.

Lazarus turned her head, looking at Heartworm. Cooly, she responded, "Hello."

[colour=f6989d]"In geologically rewiring antarctic region around the stable godflesh housing the remilitarised undead Pronobii, Vestec continues a pattern of divine saprophagy,"[/colour] answered Heartworm, hooves clicking towards the uneasy psykers as Zyle [i]'ooo'[/i]ed. [colour=f6989d]"Raises questions of an underlying order in selection of characters by Fate."[/colour]

Heartworm raised an arm to the face of the nearest psyker, who didn't have time to react before a hypodermic spine emerged from between the cloven hoof and stabbed her in the eye. Heartworm retracted it and faced Lazarus, leaving the wounded dwarf clutching her face. [colour=f6989d]"Decomposing Reathos, Vestec contributed to Lazarus's resources. Scented at this location subsequently. Not responsible for birth. Lazarus emerges [i]ex nihilo[/i] via Vowzrid facilitation. Three divine entities originated here since then."[/colour]

[colour=f6989d]"Lazarus itself originated from Other contamination. Given Jvanic nature thereof and anomalous local concentration of demigods, the World Mountain theosystem holds scientific value to Heartworm."[/colour]

Pause.

A beak tapped Lazarus's feathered shoulder. [i]"That means she likes you,"[/i] whispered Zyle excitedly.

Lazarus looked at Zyle briefly, before returning her gaze to Heartworm. “It’s good to see someone who is as interested in theosystems as I. I’ve come across some,” Lazarus paused, “startling discoveries, to say the least. Nothing more than theories, but I believe in those theories.”

Lazarus then turned, plucking a wooden machine off of one of the tables. She briefly looked over it, before asking, “how much do you know about divinity?” 

[colour=f6989d]"Observations,"[/colour] said Heartworm without nodding. [colour=f6989d]”Primarily of deity-avatar psychic link. Various other data spanning eight million years. Heartworm has dissected one god to date.”[/colour]

“My theory is that even the most powerful of gods is mortal. Inexorably so. The universe is finite, and so are we. Do you know what that means? We are all dying. Eventually, both our works and ourselves will be gone, dust to the wind. I may have bought myself time when I ascended, but my work is not yet over.” Lazarus stopped, staring at Heartworm.

Heartworm said, [colour=f6989d]“Correct.”[/colour]

She waited for an elaboration.

[colour=f6989d]”Analysis of Logos’s communication with Jvan suggests that they have collided before. Prior universe now non-existent. Logos’s behaviour reflects on multiple realities lost to absolute entropy. Evidence for consecutive worlds is abundant. Vakarlon was one iteration old upon modification. Within each, time races towards exhaustion. Gods die.”[/colour]

[colour=f6989d]”However, inter-universal travel is possible. One-way. Dreams attributable to Jvan document her ascension to an entity tunnelling between worlds indefinitely upon destruction. All-Beauty. Estimated age several hundred consecutive universes. Survival is contingent on her fractal nature. Reincarnation follows a constant pattern of birth from nothing until death of that world. Jvan is universe cancer. Grows eternally with no end point. Thus escapes entropy while also facilitating it.”[/colour]

“Yes, this is all evidence of prior and future universes. But, the question is, how do we survive it? With our power intact? This is what I want to find out. I did not ascend with the intention of being stuck in an endless cycle of rebirth at my initial point of ascension. I ascended with the intention of living forever. Because despite the horrors I’ve seen -- which have destabilized my foresight and hindsight to the point many would call me mad -- I was born into this world with the intention of immortality. If I am at risk of being reverted at the end of the universe, I am not immortal.”

Lazarus stopped, silently staring at Heartworm. Somewhere in a corner, Zyle’s beaks were pressed together, looking thoughtful and nervous. She then continued, “Time ticks on, you know. With or without us. I intend to avoid being left behind.”

[colour=f6989d]“Jvan’s memories contain answers for Lazarus,”[/colour] said Heartworm simply. [colour=f6989d]“Entropic death does not concern me. Heartworm was designed for a function. At the death of this world, that function will have been executed. Heartworm will be complete.”[/colour]

Zyle made a faint ‘wow!’ sound, then raised an arm. Heartworm sent a telepathic blip, which he took as permission to speak.

“Madness is a vague and relative term rooted in abnormality for which unique individuals have no base of comparison,” said the Sculptor. It was quickly becoming clear where he’d picked up this particular style of speech. “I came here by choice, to a place I’d never been, full of magic I’ve never seen and a literal demigod who could be hostile, for reasons I don’t understand. I’m crazy, by your definition, and maybe that makes me trustworthy, if I may please say a thing.”

“I have a friend, I do. Help. Two hundred years old, has seen cities rise and fall. They can live for millennia more. In mortal terms, Help is undying, and lives with the biotechnological resources of a god and time enough to go anywhere and do anything they could ever want, except the one thing they wanted to do. They say that there’s no purpose to immortality if it’s spent stagnating. If Fate let you achieve your dream, what would you use it for? Infinite time? Infinite power? Why are you alive other than to nurse your fear of death like a parasite?”

“There are many mysteries left unchecked. I know far too well how precious little we know of this world. This universe, indeed this very existence is an enigma. It is not just a fear of death. It is a fear of dying without ever knowing our true potential. Some say we should be satisfied with our position in life. I disagree. What is a being worth if it does not improve upon itself? What does it add to the table?” Lazarus responded.

Zyle was confused, if interested. “I… Don’t think you need more than one eternity to know yourself,” he said after a while, “but I like that because it’s a big dream.”

[colour=f6989d]“Arm,”[/colour] interjected Heartworm, tossing at its lieutenant the tendon lance he had handed over earlier. It wasn’t clear how it had been retrieved. [colour=f6989d]“We investigate now. Guide us,”[/colour] continued the avatar, pointing briefly to Lazarus. [colour=f6989d]“Your empire is an effective resource base. Symbiosis can be arranged.”[/colour]

“Guide you where? I don’t go into public anymore.” Lazarus responded, not moving. Her form continued to waver in the air, unsteady despite her deliberate idle movements. There was a small silence. Zyle winced as if flicked by something, and promptly left with his wyrm, looking back at Heartworm.

[colour=f6989d]“Lazarus is not the first god to try hiding her malaise from Heartworm,”[/colour] said the Emaciator. The room was empty but for them now. [colour=f6989d]“I helped Vakarlon. I can help you too, for a price.”[/colour]

“I do not require help. You seem to forget that I know plenty more than you about the inside workings of divine energy,” Lazarus responded, “I know what I am doing.”

[colour=f6989d]“False,”[/colour] said Heartworm. It lifted an arm and set a small sphere of mangrove wood on the table. [colour=f6989d]“Burn it. I’ll be there when you do.”[/colour]

It turned, and left Lazarus to her devices. Lazarus only gave it a brief glance before returning to her work. She didn’t look twice at the artefact.

[center][h3]* * * * *[/h3][/center]

The Emaciator would not wait on Lazarus’s reclusive pride. The dwarven empire was an asset it was not willing to pass up, and if it was going to claim a share, it had work to do. It found Zyle waiting outside, chatting and gesturing.

“...So of course the second mechanism is bound to the first and provides most of the thrusting power once set off by the initial release of force, and that happens when you pull the trigger because that’s what triggers are for no wait hold it like so wait no your hands aren’t made for it nevermind. Anyway the neurotoxin is strong enough so half the time I mean I don’t actually-”

The psyker was cautiously looking back and forth between the excited Zyle and his gestures to the muscular bows built into the lance. Listening, clearly, with some detached part of his mind, while keeping a high alert. High enough, to his every credit, to shift his guard towards Heartworm when it levitated from the hall of the Empress.

And not nearly high enough to avoid the needle.

The scalpel hand withdrew as quickly as it had come. No longer making use of either limb for locomotion, Heartworm hovered with long arms held loosely at its sides, work-ready. The psyker staggered back with a fist to his eye and a rune in his hand, shouting for aid; It batted him with a forearm and he fell silent.

Zyle looked up giddily.

[colour=f6989d]“Lazarus unresponsive,”[/colour] said Heartworm. [colour=f6989d]“We do this ourselves.”[/colour]

An audible gasp from Zyle. He adjusted his grip on the venom lance and flipped himself onto the back of the wyrm. “We’re going data hunting? Really? You and me really?”

[colour=f6989d]“Correct,”[/colour] said the voice from the pod, vivid lights patterning the surface of its visor.

[center][h3]* * * * *[/h3][/center]

[colour=f6989d][i]Our forays reveal basic flaws in the dwarven caste system.[/i][/colour]

Peasants, miners, craftsmiths, warriors, psykers, and the shamed. All of one kind. Some blessed, perhaps, by the runes of the Empress, and some given of particular talents that had led their ancestors into certain castes, or else cast down into the depths by virtue of their crimes against the Empire. But at heart they were all of a kind.
Despite clumsy attempts at eugenics by the psyker oligarchy, they maintained close relations. Intermingled and intermarried, rose from stratum to stratum by merit, as could be expected. They were a hardy people, adaptable and diverse.

[colour=f6989d][i]Inefficiency.[/i][/colour]

Yet they suffered from the fault of all species that spread by versatility. Designed for resilience as individuals, their communities forced each dwarf to specialise as they increased in size. Faced with performing a single task for the whole of their life, much of the dwarven potential went to waste. No matter how many dwarves the Citadel held, there was only so much diversity they could produce. Only so much talent to be wrought from a single set of genes.

[colour=f6989d][i]Castes shall be refined. Fitted to their tasks.[/i][/colour]

Had Heartworm the choice, it would have arranged the Empire like insects in the snow, breeding, feeding, divided by bodily function, their sentience as specialised as their form. Antarctic termites, tunnelling as one vast entity of a million units.

Alas, control was to be shared with the Empress and Heartworm had no intention of instigating divine conflict.

[colour=f6989d][i]Psychologically individual still. Lazarus is to retain control through cultural means.[/i][/colour]

As such, no phenotype would be truly optimised. Each caste was to resemble a dwarven ideal. The divergence would be a moment not of shattering, but of ascension towards sacred forms- Those of the animals that the dwarves revered, and looked to as symbols of their newborn race.

The blow of change would be softened by the aesthetic and cultural values of the polar folk. And yet…

[colour=f6989d][i]Invasive procedures.[/i][/colour]

Once, long ago and under the coercion of its creator, Heartworm had blended the Rovaick gene pool, thinning their blood into a broader spectrum of traits. Traits that combined in many ways, yet did not easily coexist.

Now the goblins had come full circle. From many kinds, by the hand of Jvan, a mix; From a mix, by the hand of Lazarus, a pure breed; From a pure breed, by the hand of Heartworm, many kinds. Apt, maybe, that a now-free Emaciator would be the one to divide their descendents once more into a multitude.

It knew that the operation would be no kinder in reverse.

[center][h3]* * * * *[/h3][/center]

“Go- Go- Hither, [i]run-![/i]”

Their steps beat a rushing trail of sound down the corridor. Behind them, neither the metals nor the warriors were still screeching. Devina stared down into the torchlight ahead. She had never thought of this passage as long, but now she knew she had been wrong, so, so very wrong.

She turned just in time to see the other woman collapse.

“Hither!”

Irrong’s head strained to rise. Her eyes were shut and streaming with tears; Her arms were wrapped around her swollen belly. [i]‘I can’nae,’[/i] she mouthed, unable to speak between gasps of exhaustion. [i]‘Devina...’[/i]

The metal sounds began again. Devina looked up.

A vast, dark eye stared back down at her.

She screamed. Something pale moved. She didn’t wake up for almost an hour. By the time she did, the things had gone.

She crawled towards Hither. She was still breathing. There was a long scar across her abdomen where her shirt had been slashed open, the flesh sealed shut as if by burning.

“Hi-Hither...”

Hither looked at her and she realised that they were both weeping in equal measure.

“Ye live,” said Hither, taking Devina in her arms. “By the g-gods, Dev, ye live. And th-the bab lives too.”

Devina put her hand to the mark on Hither’s belly as if fearing it would burst open at her touch.

“We’ll raise him, Dev. The demons c-can’t take him from us. Never. An’ we’ll raise yers also.”

Devina looked down further, saw the scar on her own body, and screamed.

[center][h3]* * * * *[/h3][/center]

They did raise the babies. Devina and Hither both gave birth within two months, in the warm underground chambers reserved for that purpose, surrounded by tokens of good luck and midwives who had seen no rest. A son to Hither, and a daughter to Devina.

The labour was hard, for their children were large even from birth, and they grew quickly. There was hair on their heads from the first day, and on their jaw, both as white as age. Before they were weaned they had a coat of warm fur.

Their children grew, and they were both tall and bulky. They ate ferociously as youngsters, until their arms were thick with fat and muscle and only the deep winters could touch them, even outside. Often they walked on their knuckles, not only in play but by nature. Their brows were thick, their skin dark, their eyes lidded, and their voices boomed across the mountains with youth and strength.

The dwarves raised their babies, and they loved them. And they were not alone. Among all the peasant children born from that day, the son of Hither and the daughter of Devina were not alone.

[center][h3]* * * * *[/h3][/center]

The miners were the first to be afflicted.

Worms came from the depths they had created and the caves they had not probed. Worms came from the darkness, from the water of the flooded tunnels. The worms came when they were asleep. And after a while, the worms came when they were awake.

In the plague of those days, neither man nor woman was spared. While the demons rampaged through the tunnels of Dundee, wormwounds began to mark the miners at their work, one at a time, for the worms never struck twice.

A bitter blessing that was, for the worms struck deep.

Even when the bleeding stopped it was days before the wounded felt the crawling cease. Even when life slowed to a pace that approached normal they knew something had changed. Even before they saw the surface workers raise their strange offspring, they knew the children they had lately conceived were not theirs alone.

The miners were born thin and pale, with muscles in odd places and teeth that could grind rocks. Their beards were all the hair that remained to them, and it was not fur but whiskers, long, stiff feelers that twitched back at the slightest touch, stirred at the faintest change in the tunnel air. Though gangly and stiff, their backs and their brains did not tire of the relentless chipping that comes with a pickaxe. With shrivelled ears and shrunken eyes they clambered into the mines, climbing the walls and ceiling with padded fingertips, and hooked claws.

With a lick of stone they found ores, and with a memory as clear as water they found their way in the maze. Touch guided them and instinct kept them, and the dwarves of the depths found their home in the darkness.

[center][h3]* * * * *[/h3][/center]

As food from the surface gardens and mushroom farms, and as water from the snow-born aquifers, so too did spirits flow through the heart of the dwarven community. Even now.

The Jvanic monsters seemed to know this, for the Citadel was under no illusion that they wanted the dwarves alive. And so the breweries were left untouched in all their mycelial splendour, the dry clack, flow, and bubble of gears churning vats.

[i]Left untouched, until-[/i]

Bruss heard a sound like joints popping and another like metal banging, and by the time he turned, the warrior skewered on the business end of the meat lance was too paralyzed to breathe.

“Hi, we’re demons,” said Zyle.

A moment of yelling as Bruss went to raise the alarm. There was another popping sound as the spearhead was retracted on its mechanisms, leaving perfect leaking holes in the front and back of Grint’s breastplate. The poisoned dwarf slumped. Bruss didn’t see it happen, but he didn’t need to.

He ran, crying out at the top of his lungs, and a hand caught him by the shoulder. 

It had scalpels for fingertips.

Bruss felt something nick his skin through his clothing, saw a faint twitch in the tubing that wreathed Heartworm’s forearm, and felt his senses blacken.

[center][h3]* * * * *[/h3][/center]

Though an outsider might not, at first, understand the genetic origin of the miner and surface caste phenotypes, few would be mislead by that of the specialist. As those who walked the snow were born of [i]saru,[/i] the wise mountain monkey, and of the snow ape some call yeti; And as those who clawed the stone bore blood from tunnel-rats, revered and feared for the blind cunning of their broods, so the craftsmith caste were derived from the bats of the woods.


[center][hider=A youngling.]
[img]https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/157531783779319808/288798478987952130/Miekenoodle.png[/img]
[/hider][/center]

Even with the Emaciator’s accelerating touch, their gestation was not quick. The first were born months after the wormwounds healed. They clicked and twitched, sniffled and stared, with keen senses and curious minds; With agile hands and light, fast little bodies that feared no fall. They were the ones who, one day, would navigate the mountains and the ices with echoes in the night, though the cold gnawed their fragile fingertips.

This is what they inherited.

[i]A line one hundred strong, dazed and calm, though they knew not why. From the corpses of things that looked like hearts with helmets did the one-eye demon feed them sweet tidbits, and their minds sharpened, turned to escape that was quickly proven to be impossible to them.

The Emaciator walked among them and they did not fear. The Emaciator showed them the grey flesh, and the one-eye demon placed it into their hands, let them feel its warmth.


The one-eye demon taught them that there was a spirit in the flesh, one that they would have to come to know for themselves. He showed them how they might grow this flesh in pots of rotting food, stretch it like taffy, blow it like glass. He was patient and he was cheerful, and the Emaciator was swift in his shadow.

Swift to bleed them if they rebelled. Swift to their aid if they struggled. Silent and ever-present, it hovered above them, a single touch of its hands correcting their errors, guiding their hands, scratching perfect diagrams into stone walls. Its pacing was perfect, its knowledge supreme.

They learned what stimuli could be derived from mineral and plant and intuition, applied on the tip of a pin.

They learned how to spin a matrix of arksynth that caused pastes of yam and sawdust to fizz and ferment. Its milk was flavourless, yet unmistakably strong.

They learned how a sac of ‘synth like a twisted octopus could be stitched together with spider’s silk on a crystal needle. Filled with coal and hung next to the skin, they produced warmth for hours, a lifeline for those who lacked blubber and fur.

They learned that a wand hardened from flesh whose recipe took weeks to complete would glow in the presence of tin-bearing rock. A bulbous flicker at the end of the rod leading them to a metal soft and pure and rare.

They learned the art of cultivating arksynth sponges that could be worn on the mouth, fitting over the face beneath a mask to keep out the deadly vapours of poorly tended mines. The dwarven masks grew fearsome and ornate, a symbol of mastery.

They learned how a bladder of air could be distilled through membranes painstakingly stretched from stemsynth after the application of saru blood, labradorite, and stonegall harvested with a blade of gold. Worn on the back, their bag of air lead into their masks by an intestine, and those that wore them breathed freely, no matter how hard the wind or high the mountaintop.

This they learned.[/i]

Cardiovascular problems set in not long after the Emaciator’s departure. Of those craftsmiths that fell pregnant after they had partaken in the drug-fueled study, none survived the bleeding during childbirth. When Heartworm left, it took away the touch that had coldly and effortlessly guided their endeavors, and their discoveries, too, became a shadow of what they had been in those weeks.

Yet this the people of the bat inherited: A pristine chamber where styli scratched and candles flickered bright at all hours. Skills bought by the curse of the cancer god, valued highly for the cost at which they had come.

An academy of flesh.

[center][h3]* * * * *[/h3][/center]

In those days and shortly after, the dwarves began to discover beasts on the ice.

Many were old enough to recall legends of brush giants, carried down still from their goblin roots. The plateau grazers were too far removed from their cousins to be recognisable, yet the primeval fear they stirred was as old as the chaos from which the goblins had come.

They were scarce. Far smaller than their savannah cousins, they were nonetheless too large for the crags, too heavy for thin ice, and too ravenous for the bare rock, though they supplemented their diet with any animal they could find and crush, and migrated north to the treeline in winter. And yet, even few in number, they were fearsome. Larger than the mastodons of the forest-tree or the sloths of the Deepwood, they bore one horn and two curved tusks at the back of their jaw, and a short trunk like a tapir. Great spines rose from their back in a forest of black wool.

Yet they met the dwarves with placid curiousity.

On the frozen sea, unusual cetacea were found. Derived from the hexetaceans of the Drenched Flowerbed, they had six functional legs, and yet spent much of their time in the water, emerging to breed and escape predation. Smooth and grey and dour, they fed by baleen, putting on much weight in krill in the summer months before hibernating in snow burrows. Though they travelled, their homing instincts carried them faithfully home when food became scarce, thick with blubber and milk.

Once land-bound, they offered little resistance to the spear.

But what else might predate them so, that these huge creatures might seek shelter on the ice?

Reports came of things that had no likeness anywhere on Galbar. Like pinnipeds in form, yet their faces were thin and sharp, like sperm whales, like foxes. Four flippers near the fore of their body carried them into a sprint with a single flick, and a dorsally finned tail propelled them to new hunting grounds. They snapped and bayed to each other in voices eerily distorted by water, and with a bladed ridge on their cleaver-like skulls, they butchered even the amphibious whales.

The dwarves that found them called them sea serpents.

But if their flexibility brought to mind a snake, other things remained of the fox and whale. The serpents were deceptive, cunning, and playful. They followed fishing vessels, and learned how to take advantage of dwarven krill-nets. Soon they were leading the boats to plentiful shoals. In time, the denizens of the Citadel began to catch on.

It only took a few stolen pups to rear the first generation of mounts.

[center][h3]* * * * *[/h3][/center]

As wagons and mills were affixed to the back of broken-in plateau grazers and herders on serpentback followed pods of hexetacea, the most magnificent creatures of all were yet to be discovered.

The warrior folk of the dwarves were born bat-like, as the craftsmiths were; Yet as they matured and their fur grew in, their true resemblance came to the fore: They were the people of the lynx and leopard.

Grey and brown, maned and spotted, their beards fitted seamlessly into the rest of their form. They had claws and fangs, the strength of peasants, the perception of adepts, the patience of miners.

But they were not born alone. Each and every warrior dwarf had a twin, one that was no dwarf at all.

They resembled one another. The catlike face, the shape of the hands and feet, even the patterns on their fur. Yet none could mistake the second pair of limbs for what it was.

[center][hider=Soon they matured.][img]http://pre06.deviantart.net/0d84/th/pre/f/2015/300/a/b/grecht_dragoon_and_taerilan_by_octagoncalibrator-d9ejcbj.png[/img][/hider][/center]

As the warrior children played and grew wise, their sisters’ wings grew stronger. They could not speak, but there was no doubt that they understood their brother dwarves. Nor would any disbelieve that they, too, had been bred for war.

The dwarves called these magnificent creatures gryphons. Heartworm clicked its hooves and couldn’t care less. One weapon was the same as the other.


[center][h3]* * * * *[/h3][/center]

If any were consoled by the Emaciator’s violence, perhaps, it was the lowest caste of dwarves: the Shamed.

Killers and abusers and insurrectionists and runaways. Their name and community stripped away, they were kept separate from all others. Once their punishments were complete- A brand to mark them, a tongue to mute them, a blade to castrate them- They were sent away to bear the worst of the work in the Citadel Dundee.

Sewer scrubbers, mine canaries, blizzard scouts, spider bait. The Shamed laboured where they were not seen, and secretly rejoiced that they had been forgotten in the Dwarven Empire’s darkest day. Some prayed that the chaos would continue, and the mountain folk would be reduced to the level to which they had been forced.

But the chaos did not continue, and the Shamed had not been forgotten...

[center][h3]* * * * *[/h3][/center]

Two figures in the dark. One tall. Relaxed, in the dangerously confident way of one about to smash a skull with his boot.

Torches weren't used here. Only bioluminescent microbial sprawl marked the walls. It cast no shadows, and relegated the face into a silhouette recognisable only by its familiarity. It was dangerous darkness. It was suspicion given form and fizzed into the atmosphere.

"Finally remembered us, did ye?" said the tall figure. "Did ye no' think that things might've done changed 'fore comin' back tae us?" The tall figure clicked his tongue and shook his head slowly. "O nae, lassie."

The smaller figure said nothing but was not silent. They could hear her breathe.

"Queer that, don'chu think? So much dwarves gettin' bleeded an' giving birth tae wee bats an' lynxes. But no' a finger wass laid on our bodies. So everything's still the same for us, nae?" The tall figure spat. Another shadow moved in the background, stood, became a dwarf; and at her example more followed.

The smaller figure breathed even, a sleek robe trapped between ragged furs and muscle.

"Way we see it, we're no' so diff'rent," said the tall one, softer now. "Ye lord over us, you and yer Emperor, but yer still one of us. Blood of our blood. But ye think ye can leash yer brothers like a mangy bitch. Ain't that just the queerest thing."

He stepped forward, his height and hatred towering, and he did not stop. The robed figure clenched her jaw and felt fear.

And she raised a rune-marked hand that shone with power, illuminating the curved horns that crowned her skull.

The Shamed Ones recoiled in agony from the light, their own branded sigils resonating with hers. With burning hand she grabbed the tall figure by his wrist and his mouth flew open, throat rattling in pain. She threw him down and pulled the knife from her belt.

The marks she made burned them both with radiant heat, but she did not falter and she was not disturbed. Even before she was finished the Shamed One's body had begun to swell and crack, his spasms quavering and involuntary, his groans vanishing. She struggled to wrest his engorged body into position. After a while, though, there was more than enough free skin to carve up.

Once complete, she left the still-growing figure on the ground, a leash around its neck. It did not struggle. It never would again.

The psyker made her way back down the corridor, where a demon was waiting, exactly where she'd last left it.

"'Tis done."

[colour=f6989d]"Adequate. Findings?"[/colour]

The psyker shrugged. "He's growing fast. I can take 'im tae the mills soon, if I find a good yoke. Bastard's got more muscle'n a coo by now, 'e'll be big's a beast by mornin'."

[colour=f6989d]"Compliance?"[/colour]

A grimace for the strange god, but she was used to as much. The Emaciator had been straightforward with the ruling caste. "Yes, yes, blinks when I tell 'im n'all that."

[colour=f6989d]"Sufficient,"[/colour] said Heartworm. [colour=f6989d]"The procedure is applicable to all dwarves. Inform Lazarus of its practical applications."[/colour] It turned, and tapped its way down the corridor.

"...Do ye always jabber like that?" called the psyker abruptly to its back.

[colour=f6989d]"Sometimes."[/colour]

[center][h3]* * * * *[/h3][/center]

And so the chaos came to an end.

Attacks slowed, then disappeared. New technologies became staples. Beasts were bred and children came of age.

In the tunnels, the worms died, and the scrabbling of miners became a sound of familiarity, wealth, family ties established through touch in the darkness. On the ice sheets, peasants formed long caravans of knuckle and tundra beasts, singing warmth to one another in a booming chorus.

In the mountains, crafty explorers picked out reagents for the ‘synth vats. In the mighty halls of the Citadel, the psykers stalked with beards flowing under their masks, weaving runes that dazzled and dismayed.

In the dirt, the Shamed laboured without word or thought, giants that taught a grim lesson.

And in the skies, the warriors marked the borders of an empire on gryphon’s back.

Peace. Labour. Prosperity. Birth.

Life went on.

[center][h3]* * * * *[/h3][/center]


But the demons were not gone. Not entirely. 

They lived on in the hearts of the scarred, still lurking behind corners, still alive in the sounds of the night. They lived on in the artificer caste, whose families could not so easily forget their dead. They lived on in the orphan warriors whose parents had died that their gryphons might live. They lived on in the horns of the psykers and the fear they commanded.

The songs and stories of the Citadel Dundee had taken a turn for the grim that was not easily shaken. A constant had been written into the dwarven psyche: That whatever glories may come had been wrought from suffering, warped by dark forces. They had been chosen for a gift as terrible as it was magnificent, and were powerless to decide their fate. Much had been given to the dwarves, but something had been lost.

All knew this, though they didn’t say it.

And some knew more.

The touch of Jvan ran deep. Within each caste there was as much diversity as there had been in the dwarves as they had first been created, perhaps more. Yet once again, there were intermediates. Infertile hybrids forbidden by the psykers and sent away be fearful parents at birth, that they and their offspring might not disappear, only to return Shamed. There was a place for such infants.

All knew this, though they didn’t speak it.

And the ones who came to collect the babies knew more.

The Emaciator had come and gone. It left a shadow. A shadow of six long, reaching arms that found lone dwarves suffering from mysterious sores and curious thoughts, and plucked them away in the night.

It left a shadow in the broken chest of the eldest craftsmith to die. A whistling, piping shadow collected by the hybrids, and raised, along with its siblings, in the secret places of the mountains. Raised for harvest in the flesh of grazer calves.

And those that knew of these things knew also that the monster’s words were true, for it was a prophet. And it prophesied thus: That the Emaciator would yet return, for it had imposed on the dwarves a debt, and that debt would one day be repaid.

But there was hope. The prophet Zyle spoke to his acolytes, his suffering changelings as they thrashed among a swarm of faeries, his children unwanted and without place. He spoke even to the lowing animals in which the sweethearts grew.

He told them about the Messiah.

The Messiah would come, said the prophet, from the Emaciator and yet in spite of the emaciator. Long wars has the Messiah fought, and great peoples has the Messiah ruled. She would come from the skies and forge a new covenant with the dwarves, that they need not pay the old and bloody debt. She would stand before the Emperor and intervene for the outcasts with no fear in her heart. The Emperor stood by and watched while the people of the mountain suffered, but the Messiah would take them under her wing, and give them purpose.

And so, in the dark recesses, in the deep tunnels, in the dangerous springs and the secret places of the mountains was the Messiah’s image graven. The Messiah wore the face of death, and great weapons were around her. Sweethearts followed her, and she struck down the unworthy with her staff.

All the dwarves of the World Mountain knew this, though they were quiet.

But the Messiah would come.

Soon.

[hider=Summary?]
Zyle, a Sculptor from Heartworm’s lab, rocks up to the World Mountain and demands entry. After an altercation, he is shown to Lazarus and informs her that Heartworm wants a chat.

This precedes probably the coldest, edgiest exchange in the history of the roleplay.

The three talk about prior and future universes, about death, eternity and the quest for knowledge. Heartworm is interested in Lazarus’s creation of other demigods, and in the civilisation she’s created. It doesn’t look like she gets out much anymore, though. It seems she’s not doing too well after drinking Teknall’s blood.

Heartworm offers to help her, and requests she show it her vision for the future of the dwarves. Both are refused. Heartworm gives her an artefact by which it can be contacted in case she changes her mind about the former, and heads off to take care of the latter.

Zyle, ever lighthearted, is thrilled about spending more time in the citadel. It seems like he has a kind of fanboy crush on Heartworm? also he keeps dropping hints about other sideplots as random babble, where does he get this stuff

ALSO Zyle is packing a tonne of experimental bioweaponry that Heartworm developed for [b]a freepoint[/b].

Heartworm and Zyle go data hunting. Heartworm decides to get a massive stake in dwarf society with or without Laz’s permission.

Cue lots of worldbuilding.

The dwarven caste system is turned from a social hierarchy into a set of morphs which cannot produce fertile offspring. Heartworm, being Heartworm, does this in the quickest, most efficient way possible, at the expense of life and morality.

The castes are as follows, in loose order of prestige:

-Psykers rule the roost. They haven’t changed much, but they have horns now. Their beards are unchanged.

-Warriors are few in number, but well equipped for combat- Strong, fast, keen senses, the usual. They have little fur goatees for beards. They resemble bats and lynxes.

-Artificers are reasonably common. They’re small and fragile, so they can’t handle polar extremes or hard labour too well, but they’re very dextrous climbers and craftsmen with excellent senses including echolocation. Good scouts. Mediocre beards. They resemble bats.

-Miners are common. They’re oddly proportioned for fights or travel, but they’re tireless workers in the mines. They’re also excellent at navigating by touch and memory and can handle poorly ventilated tunnels. Their beards are stiff sensory whiskers. They resemble naked mole rats and various cave-dwelling creatures.

-Peasants are also common. They’re larger than most dwarves and much heavier. Covered in white fur, thick fat and muscle, they’re very durable, if not exactly long-lived. They have very loud voices for calling across tundra and sea ice and very dense beards that form part of their insulation. They resemble Japanese macaques and yeti.

-The Shamed are rare. They’re a criminal caste mutated by psyker magic into hulking dwarf-like beasts with poor mental faculties.

[b][s]1 Might for caste system.[/s] [s]...I could do this for free, now that I think about it, since it’s a very Jvan thing to do. Nothing much going on here but flesh adaptations. Heartworm’s pretty powerful outside of combat. I’LL PROBABLY NEED THE MIGHT LATER SHHHH.[/s]

Actually nah let's keep it there. Helps measure contested checks, so to speak.[/b]

Heartworm also overhauls dwarven animal agriculture, using flesh powers to create plateau grazers (distant cousins of the brush beasts that resemble giant black-furred tapirs with tusks and a horn, used as beasts of burden and for wool), a new kind of hexetacean (six-legged land whales that can sustain themselves on krill and be milked or slaughtered while hibernating on land in the winter when the ice shelf expands), and sea serpents (seal mosasaurs of some kind used as water mounts and hunting animals). [b]Free because flesh god.[/b]

AND THE LIST GOES ON

Having [url=https://www.roleplayerguild.com/campaigns/164]rolled some dice[/url] to see whether Vakarlon is feeling generous today, Heartworm also kickstarts an arksynth industry in the Citadel Dundee. [i]Note that it’s not Heartworm making the discoveries, only helping out the process.[/i] Vakarlon likes having mortals figure things out for themselves. Even if Heartworm got them high as [i]fuck[/i] to improve the work flow. They all die of overdose in the next few years. Thanks, sweetmeat!

So far the dwarves have…

-Vastly improved fermentation vats to get more of that SWEET BOOZE.

-Fleshy sacs capable of storing oxygen-rich air and delivering it to a spongy mouthpiece perfect for extremely high altitude travels.

-More spongy mouth-material that filters sulphur compounds from the air around volcanic vents. GOTTA GET SOME WORKPLACE SAFETY PRECAUTIONS FOR THOSE SPELUNKERS OUT THERE RIGHT

-An antenna-like organ that responds to the presence of tin ores! This allows dwarves to manufacture the best and cheapest bronze out there.

-Little stomachs that slowly combust coal to produce heat, helping psykers and artificers to stay warm in subzero temperatures.

And possibly more! [b]1 Might spent for four freepoint synth tech discoveries.[/b]

Eventually everything settles down and Heartworm leaves.

Zyle stays behind, though, to start a cult. With a handful of developing Sculptors, a gaggle of sweethearts, and a couple of infertile mixed-caste dwarves and other outcasts, Zyle becomes the prophet for a mysterious Messiah whose image enters dwarven culture. The Messiah is said to bring protection and purpose for all dwarves, and free them of the debt imposed upon their society by the Emaciator.

Gosh, I wonder who she might be.

[b]1 freepoint spent on starting a cult.[/b]

[b]Jvan
13 Might Ambient
8 Might in Ovaedis
3 Free Points
2C / 0D
Level Five[/b]

????????
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