The gruff, scarlet-eyed dwarf continued to gaze at Irina, raging gradually filling his eyes. Irina made the mistake of looking at his eyes, and for a split second fell victim to their eerie, hypnotic powers. Vampires, even enraged ones, possessed strange powers that could paralyze or subdue living mortals. That said, Irina was a strong-willed mortal and she managed to break free of the hold the dwarf's eyes had on her.
A second after she began to almost be sucked into the hypnotic, will-sapping power of the dwarf's irate gaze she managed to speak. "I don't know who I am, or why I'm here!" She responded, annoyed at the dwarf vampire's seemingly random rage. She didn't know what she had done to the creature to make it so angry.
"Hmm... If you don't know why you're here, then maybe you're one of us? One of the followers of the Hungering Void." The dwarf asked, a second after Irina, still unable to recall anything about her past, spoke up. The gruff dwarf's voice was still audibly angry, but he wasn't in a rush to shout at Irina anymore. Irina, taking advantage of the situation, spoke up.
"That... creature you all keep referring to. What is it? What is the Hungering Void?" She asked, courageously mustering up the needed courage to speak and to question the strange... cultists. When she asked her question all of the cultists but the dwarf shut their eyes and bowed their heads in prayer once more, as if afraid that her question would somehow frighten some powerful entity. Irina could hear the fear in their muttered prayers. The vampire she spoke to kept his gaze trained on her, seemingly less afraid than his companions were.
"The Hungering Void is... Where do I even begin? It is a malignant, powerful force of living entropy, destruction, and darkness." The dwarf vampire revealed, before pointing to the roof of the cavern. Irina didn't need to look up to see what he was pointing at. She already had. He was pointing at that strange, living carpet of darkness that clung to the roof of the cavern.
"That is but one manifestation of its mightiness. It is not the Hungering Void itself, but a creation of our master. One it has used to mark that this place is special." The dwarf continued, his scarlet eyes lighting up not with anger but with joy and reverence.
"We serve the Hungering Void. In exchange for our submission, servitude, and worship, it makes it so that in this life we enjoy many comforts. We never hunger, any food we eat tastes delicious, and some of us, like myself, are given eternal life so long as we meekly humble ourselves before it and enact the will of the void." The dwarf revealed, his words coming out faster and faster as he spoke.
"The Hungering Void is the master of darkness. It is the lord of annihilation. It is the demon lord of one of the layers of the Heart of Darkness. Someday it will draw all of existence into its light-less lair and all will either dedicate themselves to it, as we have or will be annihilated." The dwarf proclaimed. This revealed a sinister truth to Irina; these people were in a doomsday cult. That said, at least one of their members was something the woman, even without her memories, knew to be dangerous: a vampire.
"How... did you come to know of the Hungering Void?" The woman asked, somehow sure of the answer even before dwarf could respond. That said, before he said a single word he began to grin maliciously at her.
"Why... I had a hallucination, like the one that you're in now, where the Void's servants taught me all I needed to know." The dwarf revealed, a smirk on his face as he taunted her with the knowledge he possessed.
Even as I manoeuvered Irina through the hallucination I had afflicted her with I was designing what the cult of the Hungering Void would look like. Of course, some stuff was easy to come up with.
Creatures like ghouls and vampires were obviously going to be key players in this cult, as both were fairly powerful, fairly common, ravenous undead that I could control in a number of ways. Even now I was reaching out across the cosmos and selecting handfuls of vampires and ghouls to begin to convert into my cultists. I began to subtly whisper to them and I began to leave minuscule portions of my will deep in their minds, to guide them to me in my incarnation as the Hungering Void.
The Hungering Void wasn't just a demon lord of destruction, it was one of darkness, gluttony, and undeath. It would be extremely easy for creatures such as ghouls and vampires to get behind worshipping such an entity. And more than that, I planned for the Hungering Void to eventually facilitate the transformation of mortal worshipers of the appropriate level of power and piety into undead creatures. Or at least I planned to transform their bodies into such creatures. If I could separate their souls and keep their bodies I would come up with more foul schemes than to just create vampires and ghouls.
The Hungering Void would also be a creature of deception. For now, I was focused on the more honest, easily understood goals of the Hungering Void, but in time I would reach out as the Hungering Void and make contact with starving masses, and struggling farmers. Those who needed reprieve from hunger. When their crops fail and the threat of starvation looms, they'd turn to anyone who'd help them. And of course, the Hungering Void would help. In exchange for their piety.
That said, my demonic servants would play a different role in this cult. I planned to use them quite creatively. I wanted them to create the conditions which caused mortals to turn to me. They would incite feasts and revelry that drained communities of needed resources and made it easier for them to succumb to the temptation of a strange voice in their minds offering them help in exchange for loyalty, and sacrifices. And I already had thousands of demonic servants coming to my layer.
I wasn't in the Blackened Boscage at the moment, but now I had a much more accurate understanding of the layer than ever before. I sensed its every centimeter in real time, and I sensed demons from every layer flocking to the city of Dunkelheit. Knowing that the horde of demonic followers I had under my control was exploding was quite a nice feeling.
Many of them were weaker demons who wanted to serve under a ruler who could offer them chances to become stronger as well as modest protection from the predations of stronger, vaster demons. A handful were greater demons who sought to serve at the hands of a demon lord because it offered them a greater chance at evolution. Both groups were understandable in their motives.
"Demons... I am quite excited to test you out." I muttered, well aware that I possessed powers that no demon lord in history had ever possessed and that some of them made me an ideal master for demons to follow. The most noteworthy of my powers in this context was my ability to conjure interdimensional portals, which meant that I could create a portal from the Heart of Darkness to any mortal world I wanted to at any time.
"The Hungering Void calls to us, those it has chosen to serve it. It brings us here, to one of its many unholy places, and then it gifts us with the knowledge of its existence." The dwarf revealed, gesturing broadly around him as he spoke.
"You, Irina, are one of its chosen. You are one of the few people blessed with the knowledge needed to spread belief in the one who shall rule all." The dwarf informed Irina, speaking fanatically. That said, the first time Irina heard her name spoken aloud she staggered back as all of her memories flowed back into her. Althos, the origin of this hallucination, chuckled into her mind as she recalled everything. As he chuckled he began to speak.
"Irina... Serve me. Serve me and have everything you shall ever need." He whispered, not physically present in the hallucination, but somehow all around her. His whispered words caressed her mind and sent shivers down her spine.
"If you served me, you could leave your little hut. You could sleep with lords, ladies, knights, and generals, in castles, forts, and manors. So long as you served me faithfully everything you could ever want would be yours." He told her, his voice still quietly seeping into her mind. Images began to dance around her thoughts, images of her cavorting with powerful people, and of her herself becoming one such powerful person of her own skills.
"Eternity, in exchange for service. Power, in exchange for worship. All your heart has ever longed for. All it truly costs is your pride." The voice whispers, tempting her.
"But... What do you want?!" She cried out, in response to the words of the strange, otherworldly and divine nightmare who had invaded her mind.
"I am going to change this world. Forever. I wish for you to be leading my followers when I do." The voice remarks, simply. There was a power and an arrogance in that voice, a certain matter-of-fact-ness to its words. And Irina felt their power in her mind. She couldn't bring herself to dispute the reality of the voice's vision, even when she mustered all of her willpower to try and challenge the voice in her mind.
"I... Why me?" She asked, trying to rationalize it to herself. Althos was quiet for a second. The truth was that she was just an easy target for him. One of his new corruption powers allowed him to track down corrupt hearts and souls, as well as see just how corrupt creatures were. She was highly corrupt. That was why he had chosen her. That said, he didn't need
"It is your destiny. It has always been your destiny." Althos replies, infusing his voice with potent authority. Irina felt her resistance drain out of her, as the demon lord, who also happened to be a god, spoke to her. She knew, or rather she believed, that he was right. She couldn't really muster the will needed to resist his remarks.
"So... Am I just accepting my destiny, by agreeing to serve you?" She asked, mentally teetering on the edge. Above her, she felt the strange entity of living darkness, perhaps a spirit of darkness, nod and begin to silently laugh, the vibrations created by its actions reaching her down below where she stood.
"Yes. By pretending otherwise you are merely delaying the inevitable." The voice said, rattling into her mind. It was a breathy voice at the end, as though it were tired. And it was. Althos was not especially patient at the moment since he was actively unraveling secrets held by Agustino, some of which had dimension-spanning implications. That said, Irina's thoughts couldn't really muster the will to fight back against the offer made by Althos. She began to speak, and informed the deity-demon-lord that she would accept his offer and become a worshiper of the Hungering Void.
The next hour was a blur. Upon learning that Irina was going to become a cultist of mine in my capacity as a demon lord, I brought her back from the hallucination and I introduced her to the first cultists in her new cult: my three nightmarish spider-creations. This frightened the crone, but she rapidly accepted them and upon learning of their parasitic shapechanging powers quickly welcomed the three creatures into her fold.
After this we had a small feast, during which I tested a handful of my gluttonous powers, transforming how it was that Irina experienced the food she ate with me, finding it to be astoundingly delicious and filling. My powers over gluttony included the ability to alter how foods tasted, afflict people with starvation or free them from hunger, and make people carve specific foods, even the flesh of other members of their own species or even worse, their families. It was a delightful power set to have, especially since at this tier of influence I could use my powers on anyone who wasn't a vestige.
Shortly thereafter I returned to the Heart of Darkness with various goals in mind. One of my big goals was to design the home I would have for myself in the Blackened Boscage, and also for me to commune with the Heart itself. I had questions, and I could only hope that over the course of the next few hours I would learn the answers of some. That said, the instant I returned to the Heart of Darkness my mind was filled with a notification, one that in and of itself brought a confident smirk to my face.
