589 Nemesis Cradle
A mountain stood alone in a serene valley that had few visitors ever reaching it, and a bell tolled in the distance, its sound muted by the everlasting fog that covered this mountain and the tower that had been built on top of its peak.
This mountain and the valley were owned by the Boreas Family, in fact, every mountain and valley on this entire planet was owned by the Boreas family. The name of this world was unknown, but for the few who knew its name, this world was known as Nemesis Cradle, for it was here that the Nemesis Plates were stored.
The Nemesis Plates were Transcendental Treasures that among their many uses were primarily used to record the amounts of living beings dwelling on a planet.
It could be simply called a glorified population counter, and it was deployed on almost every world owned by the Trion Empire.
The history of this particular planet was long and enshrouded in fog, but it has a significant history behind it.
The Nemesis Plate were all found on this planet and were not created by Boreas as it was popularly claimed.
Boreas himself has been searching for a method to create these plates and even after he destroyed a few of them in his failed attempts to replicate all their functionalities, he could not make it work exactly the way he wanted them to, as the originals were special and could not be duplicated.
On this day, an Earth god of the Boreas Family climbed up the mountain followed by twelve Guardsmen in shiny blue armor.
This Dominator appeared to be very old, his back was bent and his face was filled with the lines of age, but this did not impair his movements at all, as he easily climbed the tiny steps that had been cut into the mountain without any sound, even the twelve Guardsmen with him did not make any sound, even in their heavy armor.
The bright eyes of this Dominator were unlike an old man but was lively as a child. He was one of the few who was not entrenched in the politics of the Empire but sought a relatively thankless job and lived his life in peace and quiet and he hoped to die in that manner—With dignity, surrounded by his children and descendants, but the gods of Trion had a different plan for him.
This old Dominator was one of the beneficiaries of the loosened restriction of the gods on all their bloodlines and he had been on the verge of death when the bloodline knot was loosened and he became an Earth god almost without any barrier at all, for his foundations were strong.
He did not regret this occurrence though. No one would ever refuse more time to live, he loved his work and this world he lived in, and he would make sure it was protected, but the news he had been getting for the last few days had been worrying, to say the least, and now that he was here, it was worse.
They were halfway through their climb up the mountain when he stopped and looked at his feet, his blue robes were heavily stained with red, and it was getting a bit harder to move as this red was nothing else but thick blood and it was beginning to congeal on his feet.
This place was a holy site and so they were all forbidden from using their powers when they climbed these mountains and had to use only the strength of their bodies.
This was the reason he was here, as he heard a report of blood flowing down this mountain for the last few days and he had hurried over to check, knowing that such an event was unprecedented.
A particularly strong breeze blew past and revealed that the valley below was no longer a valley, but could be termed a lake, but it was not filled with water but with blood. This breeze drove the stench of blood into the face of the old man and the lines in his face deepened.
In a few minutes, he reached the peak of the mountain and stood before the Tower. Its structure was alien, using a style not of Trion, but something that had too many odd stylistic choices that had to come out of the mind of a mad individual.
He had always imagined this Tower to be built by insects, he did not know why those thoughts always entered his head anytime he spotted one of these, maybe it was the way it seemed as if it was made from sand, and he always imagined billions of insects just slowly building the tower not brick by brick, but grain by grain, while using their saliva as a binding agent.
Aware that he was distracting himself from his tasks, he shook his head and proceeded towards the door of the Tower while wading through blood that was two feet deep.
The door had been sealed tight, but this did not stop the blood from escaping through the small cracks below the door. Reaching the halfway point to the door, he stopped and nodded at the Guardsmen, they acknowledged his order with a fist to their chest and all of them proceeded to walk past him and reached the fifty-foot massive doors of the Tower.
With six on each side, they all grasped the circular handholds on the door and began to pull it apart. The door seemed to resist their effort at first, but with a loud crack the door parted with explosive force and a massive wave of blood gushed out with so much force it flung the unlucky Guardsmen from the mountain peak.
The eyes of the old man widened and he braced himself before billions of gallons of blood buried him. A few moments later, the blood had flowed past and he stood back up, except for the white of his eyes, he was fully coated in blood.
He gasped and began walking towards the Tower with renewed determination, he wished to investigate this matter and be done with all of it.
The atmosphere inside the Tower was subdued and the air was filled with faint screams as if an entire world was wailing in pain. As the Dominator entered the Tower the screams increased to a feverish pitch and he had to squeeze his ears tight and block his perception or he feared he might have gone mad.
This was not far from the truth as the Dominator felt his mind slipping away from his grasp, he groaned and began moving forward, unknown to him his ears and eyes had begun to bleed profusely. In a moment he discovered the source of the blood, it was a Nemesis Plate.
