An Eldritch Legacy: Sin & Sacrilege

But the Count was ignored all the more, as the butler and the priest went to work. Using Adler's unique insight into structural design and the priest's delicate hand at carving and finishing, a throne was born—beautiful and eerie, forged from silver and bone harvested from the monsters and mercenaries. These remains were boiled together with what Krael assumed to be the essence of the Silver Star—a silvery liquid, unassuming, from which he felt nothing special. But that was expected.

A mortal may never realize they sleep beside gods—simply because they were mortal. The same applied to the Count.

His existence was not strong enough to perceive the complexities of creation, so he could not feel anything from this so-called Essence of the Silver Star.

But Adler would tell you a different story. Whenever the essence was brought out, he felt an aura of desolation, a majesty born of ruin and madness—so deep, so intoxicating that if it were released fully into reality, any who stood under its light would become thralls to the Star's cause, even if it merely shone.

After the bones were melted, intent guided the forge. A throne was envisioned—not large, yet not diminutive. It fit the call of a princess. A little queen.

Its design was plain at first—nothing extravagant—until the hides were melted and fashioned to cover the throne in a splendor Adler never imagined could come from such hideous things.

From the sidelines, Krael watched like a bystander, feeling his life slip from his control. He was no longer the center of attention. His story was being stolen.

Her importance now seemed far greater than his petty pride and arrogance—things he'd picked up like trinkets on the roadside, born from pity and familiarity, a peasant that was never meant to be queen, would seat on a throne his butler helped build in his own house.

Now, she slept soundly as they built a throne for her, a priest had descended from the heavens, like an emissary of the divine, to ensure nothing went wrong with a peasant's awakening.

And he was asked to be in charge of it all, if one did not feel insulted after all this

'What is happening?'

He watched the events unfold as if reliving a memory he was never part of. Adler—his loyal butler—had devoted himself to building a ritual fit for a queen, while his master was left unattended, hollow, detached.

He saw the priest holding something akin to a crucible made of mercury, flowing like living water. It appeared suddenly on his person, as if it had always belonged there.

Within it, he could see the souls of many, their screams and dreams echoing within. Forgetting he was never meant to grasp any of it, but the knowledge came unbidden—like he was watching a play where he knew the lines, even without consent.

At this point, he felt like a bystander in his own story. Any emotions he might have felt were walled away, not by will but by instinctive detachment.

He slipped further, watching as they set the sleeping girl upon the throne. She fit it perfectly, crafted for her, each detail aligning to make her the center of everything. He could have sworn she smiled—and any other time, he'd think she was mocking him—but even that thought escaped him.

His thoughts did not make sense to him.

The ritual continued, his inner turmoil irrelevant.

Krael had never truly found himself. His constant shifts veiled him from ever becoming what he wanted the world to see. He was passive, struggling for pride, for honor, believing he had sacrificed his life through the contract—but those people weren't him. They had the look, the feel, but they were bland reflections, incomplete versions of the Count he never truly was.

It took this moment to remind him. He had never been truly himself until now—watching destiny prioritize another. She had not awakened, yet already, she was the focus. The random girl he'd picked up had gotten there first, gaining the attention of the Entity.

Before he had even fulfilled any of what he was meant to, he had been discarded like a broken pawn.

She would awaken a mysterious bloodline before him—and he would be obligated to watch like a side character.

He didn't know how to feel, his body was not his own, his mind frayed and detached his soul empty, as had a familiar pair of eyes not long before.

He watched the priest open the basket, retrieving a heart older than the rest—the first mercenary's. The knowledge flooded his mind without consent, like scripted exposition.

The priest slit the heart, bathing the girl in its ichor. Then, he tossed it into the mercury crucible, slit the remaining hearts, and poured their blood inside as well.

The others had not right to bathe the young queen, their sacrifice was not enough to wash her mortality away.

Beneath the crucible, a violet flame ignited—not for boiling, but to draw forth the final emotions of the dying, feeding them to the souls within, easing their hunger.

Part of it was fed to her. She frowned in pain, then relaxed.

Not all was given. The priest stopped before her lust for it awakened.

Why? Krael wondered. The answer came unbidden.

 'Because she must anchor her awakening in ruthless savagery, to symbolize that she did not gain power by birthright—but by conquest. You have become a pawn of fate. You led her here, gave her the path to become ruthless. Where else she might have just died in the cold.'

'You have helped destiny crown a queen.'

The words were meant to provoke, but he felt nothing. No rage, no pride—only emptiness.

He watched as they plucked eyes, crushed them into a salve, and smeared it across her eyelids. The sights were gruesome, but he could not look away.

Why?

 'The eyes are windows to the soul, holding raw emotions and truths. Through their fear, she sees her own soul, her dominion of soul. A queen must never be blind to her own heart.'

The remaining parts of what remained, the heads, the crushed skulls and brains were fed to a black shard—a beast in its hunger, devouring them in savagery he had only seen the girl display in her desperation. Nothing was left but a mess and gore.

The shard, soaked in the crucible's contents, was engraved with words the count could not read, but they held a weight he could feel even in his detachment, a weight that felt boundless, and so bottomless, it sought to crush his spirit, but he bore its curiosity, as it were pierced into her flesh above the heart.

Why?

 'To bind her name and nature to the truth of her heart, awakening awareness of her bloodline, her legacy—to stabilize her fractured existence.'

Then, what remained was poured over her body, drenching her in what should have corroded even gods. Yet her face was serene—as if bathed in warm water.

The blood flowed through runes carved into her skin, the contents moving all over her body as if in worship. It licked at her wounds healing a making the old wither and the new appear.

Why…?

 'To awaken her dominion of blood and body—to purge all things not meant to be within her.'

'Are all rituals this gruesome?' the detached Count asked.

 'Yes. Some worse than the other. You would never know what mortals endured to shed their mortality. Question their pride, but never question their sacrifice, for they have known what it means to crawl against the dirt like the ants they are.'

He watched the priest and Adler who assisted him step away from the throne, as chains of tainted silver formed from the throne, binding her wrists, ankles, and neck in what may have looked like torture, but she looked more majestic that way. She looked like a queen deserted by her subjects.

He didn't ask why. He had a feeling that he knew, he just needed to look within and the answer would come to him, but he was tired.

He wanted to sleep, to leave behind all the woes of life, for another. If he were in his sense he would have realized this was what happen every time his personas switched to replace him, whenever he wanted to retreat, to hide in the safety of his mind—but just before that wish took hold, the priest spoke, interrupting his thoughts brutally.

But it was not nearly enough.

He couldn't understand the words, lost in a daze, he failed to realize what they asked of him.

So, he only acted, his body doing what was asked of it without input of his mind.

He drew a blade over his palm.

His flesh opened into void, not flesh—nothingness.

And in eternity, his blood flowed—slow, heavy like stars, it had a weight to it that would crash cities in its weight. It pooled mid-air, molten obsidian veined with ethereal silver.

The aura around it was one of cold pride, a blazing pride, a pride hat shifted so naturally, as though it was the origin of it all.

It held a boundless aura that saw, that even just a drop felt like an oceans' worth. There was a hint dark malevolence that lay slumbering, a madness that acted as they chains, which bound its flesh.

But none of this could be felt by the count.

When enough had left him, it wormed toward the girl like sharks to blood.

It drilled into her body, with ruthlessness that made hers look like child's play, it spared her no mind, for subtlety, it conquered and queen or not, she would bow before it.

She woke with a roar, not feminine—but bestial.

She screamed and roared, a sound that split the chamber.

Worst of all, Krael and Adler could not tell—

Was it from pain—or excitement?

The nuance was lost within the growing daze of everything.