Gaiden 01 — Demonion

The Demonion Gaiden had begun. Not a story of conquest. Not yet.

It was a rib. A single, thirty-foot-long rib of black metal and living sinew. Runes of annihilation pulsed along its length, dying and igniting in a slow, painful rhythm. It was alive. And it was hungry.

A slender, insectoid demon with cracked amber eyes crawled onto the parapet. Kael had been his strategist. Now, he was just a beggar. "The goblin courts spat me out. Too much politics, not enough blood. I come bearing a scrap of news. Perhaps the last scrap." Demonion Gaiden 01

As Zagan approached, the rib thrummed . A vision slammed into his mind: the Demonion, whole and terrible, standing against an army of light. He saw his generals—Lilith, Bael, Forcas—kneeling before him. He saw the world burning.

Inside, the walls wept a black ichor. The air tasted of rust and ozone. And in the deepest cavern, surrounded by the broken bodies of the Thornwood villagers who had dared to touch it, lay the Fragment. The Demonion Gaiden had begun

The Demonion. The Heart of Chaos. The God-Machine. It had been the source of his power, a living fortress of bone and brass that ate souls and birthed armies. When the Liberators struck, they had shattered it. They believed they had scattered its pieces to the ends of the mortal realm, sealed in blessed shrines and sunken temples.

Zagan didn't turn. "Vizier Kael. I thought you’d abandoned me for the goblin courts." It was a rib

To be continued in Demonion Gaiden 02: The Blooding of Thornwood.