Epilogue

The Obsidian Dominion’s Fleet swept through Empyrean space with barely a pause. On the bridge of his flagship, the emperor looked around him with contempt bordering on pity. He made no grand proclamations, but those most loyal and trusted servants who scribed his every word were still there, scribbling down his wisdom for the future. He sighed, looking out at the worlds that passed beneath them. “They were not prepared. They chose to deny the inevitability of the future, and look now at the price they pay.”

They came not as conquerors now, but as liberators. These worlds on the fringes of Empyrean territory had been left entirely undefended. When the Grand Incursion began, there had been nobody nearby to even call for help. Their masters, duly elected through democracy, had cared only for the votes of their thralls, not their safety. They felt no duty to those they served. They had no sense of the burden of leadership. Small wonder the emperor held them in such contempt.

Each world they passed over was cleansed of eidolons. Drop ships carrying down Dominion troops drove the eidolons back to their rifts, and from the comfort of their own ships in space, the gravity magi sealed those rifts, one by one. It was as simple as closing a portal, after all. And all who had been found to bear the affinity for gravity within the Dominion were trained in this art as their most sacred duty, instead of being exploited as living spaceship fuel.

Progress into the Empyrean’s territory had been slow. Not because of the weakness of the invaders, but because of the weakness of the defenses. If the Empyrean had put up any sort of fight against the incursion, then there would have been only a handful of eidolons and Empyrean militia to clear out on each world that the Dominion passed over, but they had been so incompetent in their preparations for this kind of widespread assault that everywhere the Dominion turned was overrun with eidolons.

For the most part, Valtoris Blackstar simply observed the progress of his fleet. Standing tall and imposing in the starlight, staring out at all the universe that now belonged to him. His servants, his soldiers, his mages, and the officers of his fleet all cast glances his way each time that they had the opportunity. Just being in his presence was such a rare treat for every one of them. Yet none of them knew him, none of them recognized any part of his expression. The frustration written over his features as they crept ever closer to the core of the Empyrean, grinding over one world at a time.

He didn’t care. He didn’t want these worlds. He didn’t want any of this. It was wasted time, but he had set the standards by which any invasion had to be carried out. The completeness of the subjugation that he required before he would leave any planet with the opportunity to interfere with the supply lines of his invasion forces. Not a single eidolon could be left in their wake. Not a single Empyrean troop that might raise a weapon against him. The only kind of victory that Blackstar would accept was absolute victory. The only kind of war that he would wage would be total war.

He was going to take the entire Empyrean. He was going to take it because they had proven themselves incapable of governing themselves, and he could not tolerate a neighbor with such weakness. He was going to take the Empyrean because he could not allow a hive of eidolons to grow on one of his borders, swelling until it overran into his territory and had to be annihilated. 

He was going to take the Empyrean because it had not prepared itself for an incursion, had suffered the consequences, and been left weak. Perhaps if the Dominion’s own preparations had failed at any stage, if they had lost a single world to the incursion, then he might have reconsidered matters. But through his own empire and his own people, he had seen what a power on the scale of the Empyrean was capable of, and he had seen them fail to live up to that potential.

The incursion had, in a way, been a blessing for the Dominion. Over the past decade, Valtoris had been preparing the most talented mages to undergo their ascension to a covenant, and now he had all the raw materials required. 

There were many who said that he would not tolerate another covenant mage among his people, that it would be a challenge to his utter dominance to have anyone else within the Dominion who could wield arcane power like him, but those people, like those staring at him now when they thought he was not looking, did not know him. He welcomed a challenge, any challenge, that might drive him to greater heights. And he knew what they would all soon learn, that the thing that made him special was not the eidolon roosted in his soul, but his unbreakable will.

A signal sounded from across the bridge, a message meant for the emperor’s eyes. He waited patiently for it to be carried over to him, just as he had waited patiently throughout this whole slow drift through space. One of the robed figures who served him proffered a slate, and he took it without letting any of his disdain for this quasi-religious order show on his face. 

He needed servants, as any ruler did, but it was difficult to quash the disgust he felt for anyone who willingly ceded their independence to another. His eyes passed over the details on the slate without taking much in. Locations, time of contact. It was the description of the eidolon that brought him to a halt and made him retrace his steps. The location was an unknown planet that was absent from the star charts. The eidolons were monstrous, even by the usual standards. The Empyrean divided them into tiers based on the destruction that they could cause. These were all rated at Tier 8.

He raised a hand, and the bridge fell silent. “Plot a course to this location, maximum speed.”

There was no need for any more from him. The information required was disseminated to those who needed it, and the spells required were enacted. The fleet carried on in its slow march across the universe, and the flagship pivoted and tore away through null-space as he had commanded.

It was the first temple world that the Dominion had encountered, and its presence had resulted in messages flitting back and forth through space, back to the ships held in reserve. A full search of their territory for new planets was going to be required.

Everywhere that the Dominion had passed, there had been the same pattern playing out. Everything proceeded with lockstep efficiency, the planet locked down, the eidolons purged, and then everything moved on to the next world. Here alone, progress had stalled. The flagship arrived in orbit around the world, and immediately, Valtoris strode forward. His body turned to shadow as he touched the glass around the front of the bridge.

He arrived on the planet in the midst of the fighting. Eidolons shrieked as his covenant mages held them back, but neither side was making any sort of progress. The planet was a barren wasteland, barely worthy of a second glance, but for the fact that it hadn’t been there a week before. That, and the presence of the eidolons themselves.

They towered over the mere mortals that Valtoris had deployed against them. Reptilian and titanic, breathing lightning storms and unleashing witch-fire from their eyes. They were bigger than buildings, strong enough that they could brute force their way through enchantments that physical strength should not have been able to overcome. They were a challenge.

Blackstar strode forward, unleashing flame and shadow in whip-cracks, not trying to kill the eidolon swarm but to drive it back. He left a trail of molten footprints in his wake, and cinders trailed from his cape and fingertips as he approached.

One more covenant mage should not have made a difference. The impact of one more set of spells being flung around should have been negligible, a mere percentage change. Yet where Valtoris walked, the eidolons fell back. Where he cast, the implacable beasts flinched and staggered back. It was not his magic that was doing this.

The battle lines of the empire’s finest mages fell silent, in awe of their emperor as he marched on, unheeding of the massive beasts that stood before him. The storms were stilled and the witch-fires quenched. Finally, it was just him and the row of eidolons, staring at one another. Neither side moved. Silence echoed over the temple world as these vast, mindless beings with no will of their own came face to face with Valtoris. The mortal man with a will so powerful that he had forged an empire with it alone. He pointed to the ground, and one by one, rippling out from where he stood, the eidolons fell to their knees before him. His will replacing theirs. Complete domination.

This was what his enemies did not understand. Valtoris Blackstar didn’t need a covenant or an empire. His will was enough.