Edzul Ironsword was about to die. The legendary mathematician of Archcrystal lay in the glass hospital within Hell and received the visits by his loved ones until there was no one present besides the doctors - and Fath.
Edzul was confused by his impending death. He didn’t understand it. From a logical point of view he did not have to die. Whatever traits he could pass on to his children wouldn’t be degraded if he continued to live. He still had contributions to make to his field of study. He tried to convince himself that the order of things demanded that everything renew itself, but he still couldn’t reason past the flaws of having a mind such as his fail because of a body that can’t keep up.
Was it pride? Was it his own stupidity compared with, as Fath would say, the immense design of things? As smart as he was compared to his time, the lasting question that haunted him was this:
Is his intelligence even worthwhile compared with what could be known? That question seemed juvenile to him yet he couldn’t dispute its relevance.
It was staggering to him to think that in a century, other scholars would make discoveries far surpassing anything he could begin. And yet, it was inevitable. Edzul felt envy like he’d never felt before and he hated it. And worse, he hated the regret that all of this came with, a selfish pandering of his own perceived worth.
Fath sensed this as he kneeled gently beside his long time friends bedside.
Edzul’s voice was raspy and slow as he spoke, much like the misshapen collection of words that came out of it.
“There’s no destiny for you here... there’s none for any of us. All of our ancestors will be forgotten as you will be - as I will be. All of my work will contribute to a dying project, one that is not destroyed by the infinite time which you prescribe to, but by the walls that contain it. Stupid, stupid, stupid pride! I’ve wished for it to listen to my reason, but it can’t. It knows no such sentiment. Above all of this rambling, listen to me...”
Edzul coughed and sputtered until his lungs were wracked with pain. The doctors were already bringing over sheets to lay over his lifeless face when Fath waved them off and leant closely with his ear pressed towards Edzul’s lips. Edzul whispered sharply,
“You won’t become the singularity within the void, don’t even try.”
Fath looked downwards then up towards Edzul’s glassy eyes, “What if I can?”
“You won’t.”
And Edzul, the great mathematician of his time, exhaled his last breath with those words and passed into a blueprint of life that was not his own - one that he saw as corrupt and unfair.
With all of the rage of an adolescent teen raging against adults, Edzul passed unceremoniously into death, still convinced of his importance despite a knowledge of its intellectual insignificance. In the end he couldn’t help feeling that which he would have ridiculed in others for the same behavior. His last emotion ended up being one of regret.
In a perfect world, these thoughts and desires would have died with him, and his legacy would have been simply of a great scientist whose mind had been disrupted by sickness and old age - if it were not for Fath who resonated with Edzul’s final thoughts. His wisdom had mixed so much with his pride that it was difficult for anyone to separate the two. So Fath accepted these final moments as reason. Edzul was, after all, the last of Fath’s childhood friends and easily the closest of these. Fath had a good memory, and a part of him that was still mortal longed for the days when life between them was a series of toys and games. The toys were weapons now, and the games were deadly. Both held the desires of a person that can’t be reached anymore.
The fortress of Archcrystal continued to expand in hell down from its entrance, less like a virus now and more like a dead animal bleeding out glass walls and floors from a hook downwards to the ground.
It spread continuously and relentlessly with a steadied pace that began to worry the demons until there appeared something never before seen in their history, such as it was.
Great columns of them flowed across the pits and plains of slade. Their numbers were seemingly infinite and small skirmishes broke out with the ones that had organized and the ones that hadn’t - the ones that hadn’t didn’t last long. It was a force that stood at the gates of the dwarven invaders that had never been formed before. It was controlled and steady like the rhythm of an ancient and forgotten heart that had compensated for an atrophied exercise. They surrounded the bottom of Archcrystal completely and stared through the glass structure before them. It was a malevolent gaze tinged with awe, but focused against the scurrying creators inside.
Erith the captain of the guard looked upon the mass assembled outside and ordered his guard to take position behind their fortifications.
The demons were shredded with bolts until no more advanced and the majority of the horde stood beyond their reach, waiting and planning. For a while no one moved besides the flutter of a wing or the aim adjustment of a crossbow. Then the invading horde rushed the artifact door. The collective force shook the foundations of the fortress as the indestructible door remained unblemished, but the connective architecture that held it to the glass walls strained audibly under the sheer force of a functionally infinite number of attackers. The sounds of the glass under so much pressure echoed through hell like massive glacier beginning to crack far below its surface.
More wickedly barbed projectiles tore through the immense bodies crashing the entrance.
The sheer mass of tissue, bone and muscle created an effective barrier no matter what material it was composed of, and glass makers and masons quickly reinforced its support on the other side. It was a war of manufactured attrition now, as both sides set against each other working to undo the other’s efforts. After several hours it was clear that there would be no clear winner and the demons again receded to their ranks beyond the eerie glowing pits, but they stood in rank unlike anything the dwarves had ever seen. They waited with narrowed eyes wondering what the demons were thinking when suddenly the glass walls shook like an earthquake. Projectiles of all kinds smashed against the entrance - acid, poison, fire, webbing, poisonous acidic webs on fire. There was no end to the constant barrage of organic bullets that pelted the fortress. If it was one thing that the demons had learned from the dwarves of Archcrystal it was patience. Persistent attack would eventually sap the walls through consistency of effort. Such was the advantage of their immortality. They were committed by their knowledge of dwarven life spans and were content to wear away the defenders before them without relent like a river carving its way through a canyon of shaped glass. In a way the dwarves had made them more dangerous in that they now understood the value of concentrated effort over time and a realization that nothing was able to withstand the strategy and determination of those that are endless in both life and will.
The dwarves were doomed - had it not been for one who recently came to understand the concept of an existence where forever held a reality. Fath’s detriments became his strengths as his esoteric arguments over infinite time became the backbone of the defender’s resolve.
As he stood at the gates into hell looking through the walls of Archcrystal he was about to attempt something, that he swore he would never do.
Author
Topic: Archcrystal: 500 years in a fortress [SPOILERS] Finished (Read 494624 times)