"Ooorcuuuusss!!" Atlas bellowed, his voice tearing through stone and ash, shattering silence like a war drum that belonged to no army, only to madness. His throat ripped as sound turned into vibration, vibration into quake, and quake into the breaking of mountains.
He rose out of the crater with a grin stretched too wide, blood painting his lip, bones creaking under their own rebellion. His lungs rattled, his ribs screamed — but his face betrayed none of it.
"It hurrrtttt!" he roared.
It was no complaint. No plea. The sound was delight — reckless, childlike joy masquerading as a scream. His smile widened, crooked and unrestrained, the kind that mocked the very concept of pain.
Pride? Shattered. Vanity? Buried. All that remained was something raw, something dangerous — a forbidden joy found only in destruction.
Something new.
Orcus's voice bled across the battlefield like oil catching fire.
{{{That was my intention… jackass.}}}
