The Abyss was never silent.
Even in the deepest layers — where light dared not exist and the air boiled with the screams of the damned — the world throbbed with war. Mountains of black glass rose like jagged teeth, rivers of molten marrow cut through charred plains, and titanic shadows wrestled in the distance, their roars shaking the fabric of the realm.
Here, where even time dared not walk straight, the name Veyrith was spoken only in whispers.
The Lord of Nine Throats.
The Devourer of Saints.
The Unmaker of the Fifth Choir.
He stood upon a plateau of scorched bone, his armored frame towering over twelve feet, plates of abyssal chitin shifting with every movement. His eyes were twin pits of molten silver, swirling like miniature galaxies, cold and calculating. Behind him stretched an army — a sea of horned, fanged, and twisted things, their bodies stitched from nightmares, their weapons forged from the remains of enemies long dead.
In the distance, the enemy advanced.
Seven banners — each belonging to a rival abyssal sovereign — marched side by side. That was unusual. No lord of the Abyss tolerated another's presence for long. But today, they had come together for one purpose: to destroy him.
Above the battlefield, the sky was a swirling maelstrom of ash and fire. Something screamed across the heavens — a shadowed dragon of impossible size, its wings blotting out entire regions of land. It circled, waiting for the slaughter to begin.
Veyrith's clawed hands flexed.
"You think numbers will save you," his voice rolled like an earthquake, carrying for miles. "But the Abyss rewards only the cunning and the strong."
The first volley came — spears of crystallized void-light that hissed through the air. Veyrith's wings burst open, each one a mantle of black fire, and with a single beat he shattered the incoming storm. Ash and sparks rained down on the plateau.
Then he moved.
To mortal eyes, he would have vanished — but in the Abyss, everything could see the truth of speed. He crashed into the enemy vanguard like a meteor, his talons ripping through plated war-beasts, his tail lashing with enough force to topple siege towers of flesh and bone. Every blow he struck devoured something — life, soul, even memories — feeding him in the midst of chaos.
But for every one he killed, two more took its place.
From the east came the Burning Choir, their bodies made of fluted bone, voices chanting in unison. Their song was agony given sound — the air itself became knives, peeling the flesh from lesser demons. Veyrith roared and swept his hand forward; black flame erupted, drowning the Choir in a sphere of screaming fire.
From the west, the Legion of Chains advanced, dragging colossal iron serpents that spat venom strong enough to corrode a mountain. Veyrith tore one in half and drank its soul through the open wound.
Yet… the tide didn't break.
Lightning split the sky — not the natural kind, but Abyssal lightning, the kind that ate color from the world and left it in shades of pain. From the storm descended a figure in armor of living shadows: Zarathul, the Blade Tyrant, first of the seven sovereigns come to claim Veyrith's head.
"Veyrith!" Zarathul's voice was not shouted — it was simply heard, inside the mind, the bone, the blood. "Your reign ends here."
"Ends?" Veyrith's lip curled into something between a snarl and a smile. "No, Tyrant. This is the day your corpses begin my throne."
They clashed.
The impact flattened an entire valley.
Veyrith's claws met the Tyrant's blade, sparks of black and silver spraying in all directions. Each strike was a cataclysm — tectonic plates cracked, rivers boiled, distant mountains toppled.
But as they fought, the others closed in.
From behind came the Harrowed Widow, a spider-demon whose body was a fortress of chitin, her hundreds of eyes glowing like tiny suns. From the front surged the Mawless King, an eyeless giant whose stomach was a screaming void. The remaining sovereigns fanned out, cutting off retreat.
And above, the shadow-dragon descended.
Even for Veyrith, this was… different. They had planned this. No abyssal alliance lasted more than moments, yet they had put aside their own wars to end him. That meant only one thing: they feared what he was becoming.
Good. They should.
But they had chosen their moment well. His armies were far away, scattered across conquests. His citadels were half-built in the lower layers. And he was tired — not from battle, but from the long war of ambition, the constant clawing upward through the Abyss's infinite slaughter.
The Tyrant's blade cut deep across his chest, spilling molten ichor. The Harrowed Widow's webs wrapped around his wings, burning with runes designed to bind him. The Mawless King's void-stomach pulled, trying to drag him in.
Veyrith fought like a collapsing star — beautiful and terrible — but for every wound he inflicted, ten more came.
Finally, the shadow-dragon struck.
Its jaws closed over Veyrith's torso, teeth grinding through armor, flesh, and the ancient sigils carved into his very bones. Pain — real pain, the kind even an Abyssal Lord could feel — tore through him. He roared, black fire flooding from his throat, burning the dragon's head to the skull… but it was too late.
Something cold and alien — not Abyssal, not mortal — slithered into him through the wounds. A seal. A chain not of metal, but of concept. His power began to bleed away, torn from him in ribbons of light and shadow.
Veyrith staggered, his talons clawing at the air as if he could grab his own strength and shove it back into his body.
The Tyrant stood before him, helm open just enough to show a grin of teeth carved from the bones of gods.
"Fall, Veyrith," Zarathul said softly. "And be forgotten."
The world cracked.
The plateau fell away beneath his feet. The battlefield became a smear of distant sound and light. And then there was nothing but a rushing pull — a current without water, dragging him into darkness so complete even the Abyss felt warm by comparison.
His last thought before the void swallowed him was not regret, not despair.
It was a promise.
I will return. And when I do… the Abyss will kneel.