Immaterium, Gardens of Nurgle
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Isha
She couldn't tell how much time had passed since she'd found herself in this nightmare. For time had no meaning here; the concepts of time and space did not exist in Immaterium. Once, it had been an ocean of pure energy, but now there was only Chaos.
Of course, this was a simplification, as in the Immaterium there were places where even the Chaos Gods feared to venture and entities that even they feared to face, such as the Corpse Emperor of Mankind.
But that didn't change the fact that she was trapped here, without the slightest chance of escape, in a true nightmare. She sincerely doubted any other being could find this place so terrible and terrifying. The antithesis of everything she represented.
Where she was life, this place, like its master, was decay and death. Where her touch brought relief and solace, Nurgle guaranteed only pestilence and unimaginable suffering.
And this foul beast seemed to think he loved her. As if the personification of corruption, decay, and imminence could harbour such feelings. Nurgle simply desired what he couldn't have and what she was. Life, vitality, growth.
With a weariness that would have crushed most mortals, she slowly opened her eyes, seeing the same hopeless sight before her. Beyond the bars of the cage she was trapped in, a depressing and soul-crushing sight unfolded.
The garden of the Lord of Decay were an amalgamation of every conceivable disease, plague, and corruption. Nothing truly alive could possibly exist here... Only she suffered the agony of inhaling that nauseating air, tasting the foul and deadly brews Nurgle so eagerly fed her.
Staying here was torture, but she had to admit to herself that it was also an opportunity. For by tasting these cruel brews, she could whisper in mortals minds ways to fight and cure these diseases and plagues. Her Life against his Decay.
Every now and then she spotted tiny nurglings circling among the endlessly decaying trees. Their monstrous, little, misshapen shapes had once given her the creeps, but now she was used to them.
Even the Great Unclean One, Greater Daemons of the Plague Lord, which occasionally ventured here, disgusted her, but not because of their monstrous appearance, but rather because of the decay and stench of corruption they carried with them.
She raised her hand, taking a strand of hair that had once gleamed like silver… like stars in the firmament of the sky. Now, however, it seemed faded, more greyish. Her stay here was taking its toll on her. She was an aspect of Life itself, surrounded by corruption and decay.
She closed her eyes. A single tear rolled down her pale cheek.
Seeking solace, as so many times before, she reached out with her mind beyond Nurgle's domain, even beyond the Immaterium, to the minds of her children, or at least those who remained true to the ideals of their race. Most inhabited vast craftworlds, a marvel of Aeldari psychoengineering, while the rest lived on isolated, wild worlds scattered across the galaxy's fringes.
She too tried to reach out to those of her children who had lost their way, who had brought only suffering and death. Those who now called themselves the Dark Eldar. Even remembering for the last time how terrible that experience had been. The knowledge of how far her children had fallen and the burning touch of Slaanesh that lay upon them.
But when her mind reached the Webway, following the paths known only to her and the other Eldar gods, she felt something shift. At its very centre, where the Eternal Fortress, the seat of their Creators, Ilmarin, had once stood, she now felt only an absolute Void, consuming everything around it like a vortex with an insatiable hunger.
'Impossible,' she thought, equally concerned and intrigued.
She remembered that terrible power and the being who wielded it. Mag'ladroth was undoubtedly their most powerful adversary, at whose hands dozens of her creators had fallen. Those Whose Name Was Erased. Specifically, whose existence had been erased by the Void Dragon itself, thanks to its terrifying power, the antithesis of the Immaterium itself.
The only reason they survived the War in Heaven was because Mag'ladroth himself was ultimately susceptible to the powers of the Immaterium.
After a moment, she also realised that from within that bottomless Void, she could feel a blazing heat. A fire burnt there, fighting to not be extinguished. A fierce and constant flame that reminded her of Asuryan. However, though strong, it seemed to be losing the battle against the ever-hungry Void.
The implication of this fact, the possibility that some part of one of her pantheon had survived, filled her with both fear and hope.
Isha made her decision and without hesitation she threw herself into that bottomless void. If she were to be annihilated in the process, so be it. At least it would free her from Nurgle's clutches.
As she plunged deeper into that endless darkness, she felt her strength being drained from her, and she grew weaker and weaker. An overwhelming desperation filled her mind, awakening a long-forgotten dread within her.
Perhaps in conjunction with how weak she had become from the millennia of imprisonment that stretched endlessly within the Immaterium.
The only thing propelling her forward was Asuryan's golden flame, which seemed to absorb Void Mag'ladroth's full attention while simultaneously supplementing her own strength with its psychic power. It took her some time to break through to the miniature sun burning within the darkness surrounding it.
By the time she reached the heart of the battle, her mind was on the verge of shattering, and she could barely keep it there, away from her body. Wave after wave, Mag'ladroth's terrible power struck the blazing flame, the shard of the Void Dragon's blind fury clashing against the unwavering and unbending will of Asuryan's flame.
But she saw clearly that the latter was doomed to failure. With no escape. No chance of victory. Without help, the flame was destined to fade, devoured by the insatiable Void.
Being here now, so weak, she didn't know what she could do until she touched the flame with her mind and understood that the Flame of Asuryan and the Void of Mag'ladroth were part of the same being.
How was this even possible? She couldn't fathom it. But she knew that this person was definitely not Asuryan, or some part of him, but something entirely different, something that couldn't have been born naturally without outside interference.
The moment she realised this, she should have run as far away as possible, but that was now impossible. Moreover, she didn't know who or what this being was, but she could feel its suffering, its desperation. As the Mother of Life, Isha knew she had to do something but didn't know what.
The Void was the absolute annihilation of everything, not just matter, but energy and even souls. Her powers were useless against this primal force. Perhaps at the height of her power, she could have stood up to the Shard for a time, but those times are gone.
She could try one thing, though. So she reached out with her mind gently to the being, sending soothing and calming thoughts, "I am Isha."
"I want to help you."
"You have to fight this."
"I will help you."
"Fight."
At first, the creature's mind didn't react, but then it began to push her away. But she continued to whisper gently, mentally cradling the pitiable being like a child, pouring into it the last of her strength she could share without destroying herself.
It may not have been much, but it could have fuelled the flame and helped it last a little longer.
And indeed, the flame seemed to feed off her energy, and it seemed to work better than she could have imagined. The miniature golden ball of fire began to grow, resisting the encroaching Void.
As if gaining a second wind, the creature's will began to fight harder against Mag'ladroth's shard, and Isha, though she had no strength left, continued to send soothing and encouraging words.
At one point, the two forces seemed to reach an impasse, only to begin to collide a moment later. Like two raging rivers, the forces struggled, intertwining with each other more and more with each collision, ultimately morphing into a ball of blazing golden flames and absolute blackness, which consumed all light.
Something that shouldn't have been possible. Forces that had no right to coexist were now before her, formed into a single being. An exhausted, nearly broken being, beginning to awaken from this terrifying nightmare.
Isha, knowing she had little time, whispered her farewell words and, on the verge of exhaustion, returned to the Garden of Nurgle.
When Isha opened her eyes, hoping only for a moment of rest, the last sight she wanted to see at that moment was waiting for her.
In front of her cage stood an immense, bloated humanoid, his body swollen with putrefaction. His skin was shown as leathery and necrotic, his surface pocked with running sores, swelling buboes and oozing wounds. Internal organs bulging with decay spill through splits in the ruptured skin to hang like bunches of scrofulous grapes around his vast girth.
He was a vast mound of rotting flesh, with open sores and gaping wounds in which his lesser Daemonic minions like Nurglings cavort and frolic, bursting forth from his pustules and suckling upon their dripping foulness. Weeping pustules ooze filth, and his bowels constantly issue forth putrescent waste. His sickening, pus-covered form was accompanied by an enveloping cloud of buzzing flies.
Beneath his fingernails, maggots and other carrion feeders lay eggs around which develop cysts that periodically burst open and spew their rancid payloads.
Nurgle was undoubtedly the most vile creature she had ever seen, the mere sight of which would likely shatter the minds of ordinary mortals, if their bodies survived long enough in his presence.
"MYYY BEEELOOOVEED. WHEEREEE HAAVEEE YOOUUU BEEEN?"
The Lord of Decay's terrible voice pierced the air, sounding like a combined rotting corpse and countless beings dying in agony, consumed by Nurgle's various diseases. With each word, masses of vermin overflowed into the chaos god's maw.
Isha knew she had been discovered and that punishment now awaited her. For the Plague Lord's love was terrifying and agonising. An endless stream of torture, and Nurgle had no shortage of creativity in devising ever newer concoctions riddled with plague and disease.
She could only hope that helping this poor soul was worth what awaited her.