“You think you can get away with this, Lilith?” Aeternia slammed her gauntleted fist against the crystalline table, sending fractures racing across its surface. Her perfect features contorted with rage, white-gold armor gleaming with the intensity of a thousand dying suns. “I don’t know why The System chose to approve your little pet, but I won’t let you win.”
The chamber vibrated with her fury; a circular amphitheater where the walls themselves seemed to breathe, expanding and contracting with the emotional currents of its occupants. Viewing spheres floated like soap bubbles throughout the hall, each displaying scenes from countless mortal realms.
“Calm yourself, Aeternia,” said Solomon, his sand-brown skin adorned with rings that shifted and changed with each subtle movement of his fingers. His beard, meticulously groomed, framed a face that had witnessed the rise and fall of civilizations with the same placid interest one might observe chess pieces being reset. “If it wasn’t allowed, The System would not have permitted it. However,” he stroked his beard thoughtfully, “you must admit that this was an absolute genius of a plan.”
Aeternia’s rage cooled to a simmering contempt. She straightened, her posture becoming rigid and formal, a commander addressing an unworthy subordinate. “You don’t have the right to lecture me, Solomon. Don’t think I didn’t notice your movements as well.” She reclaimed her seat, her massive throne adjusting itself to her form as she settled. “However, you’re correct. I suppose I will tell you it was well played, Spider.”
Behind her stood Arthur, forever vigilant, his ancient armor bearing the wounds of a thousand battles, his eyes vacant yet somehow all-seeing. The once-king shifted slightly, the only indication he had heard anything at all.
“Who is this Human you chose, Lilith?” The question rumbled forth from Hercules, his titanic form dwarfing even the grand furnishings of Pandemonium. Stars themselves seemed caught in his beard, twinkling with each exhaled breath. “What great feat had he achieved for your attention?”
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Lilith moved like dark water, her obsidian skin absorbing light rather than reflecting it. When she spoke, her voice flowed around the chamber rather than through it, as if her words existed simultaneously in everyone’s mind. “He is an existence whom my Web couldn’t perceive properly, Hercules.” Her movements, smooth and deliberate, reminded all present of the predator she truly was. “It’s as if the thread shouldn’t exist. It binds others to him the more you try to pluck at it.”
“Its color?” Hercules asked, his question hanging heavy in the suddenly silent chamber. Every Constellation present understood the significance of the question.
Lilith paused at the entrance to the amphitheater, turning her head so that only a sliver of her face was visible to those she was leaving behind. Galaxies spun in her eyes as she answered with a single word: “Purple.”
With that, she faded into the darkness of the entrance, leaving the chamber in stunned silence.
The stillness lasted only moments before Aeternia erupted, her form blazing with such intensity that lesser beings would have been incinerated. “That damn thing! She gave the power of an Archon to a Thread of Chaos!” She rose from her throne, the motion so precise it seemed mechanical. “Arthur, we leave now! We need to plan.”
The knight moved instantly to her side; his steps unnaturally synchronized with hers as they headed for the exit. At the threshold, she paused, her voice cutting through the chamber like a blade. “I suggest we work together on this.” She did not look back. “I’ll be in touch.”
As they departed, the remaining Constellations exchanged glances laden with meanings and machinations beyond mortal comprehension.
“A Chaos Seed, huh?” Solomon’s tone was measured, but his rings spun faster around his fingers; a tell that only the most observant would notice. He looked to Hercules, whose massive form seemed to have grown heavier with the weight of this revelation. “You know what this means, right?”
Hercules nodded, stars in his beard twinkling with accelerated urgency. “A time of upheaval is in play, again.” His voice had the gravity of mountains grinding together. “Pandemonium will never be the same.”
In the viewing sphere nearest to them, a small blue planet continued its rotation, unaware that it had just become the centerpiece of a cosmic game with stakes beyond imagination. And on that planet, a man named Alexander Evans dreamed of spiders and threads, while around him, the very fabric of fate began to unravel.
