The patter of rain was a constant presence, louder now that the soldier was out from underneath the tons of wreckage and rubble. He basked in it momentarily, that odd sensation of the droplets passing through his incorporeal form still something he was getting used to.
The sense of freedom was overpowering, in sharp contrast to the claustrophobic conditions of his trapped body. Unfortunately, his attention was drawn away from his celebrations as his ears pricked at another groan sounding over the heavy rainfall.
Crouched down, he crept towards a smouldering remnant in front of him. Whatever it once was, its form was near unrecognisable now: soot black and warped as though it had been smelted under some intense heat, reforming into a lump of charcoal.
It is pitch black, and yet I can see it perfectly. Wait a second, if I'm incorporeal, how am I even 'seeing' in the first place? Or hearing anything? Or falling a hundred miles into the ground?
All of a sudden, the steadiness beneath his feet felt a little less reassuring.
Whatever. These are problems for a later me. For now, the fact that I can see at all is enough.
The thick stormclouds prevented any heavenly illumination whatsoever, no crescent moon nor hateful stars. The fact that he could see was no doubt a miracle, but perhaps better left explored at a later date.
Now just before the wreckage, he paused, straining his ears for any sound. The everpresent rainfall faded into background as his brows furrowed in concentration.
There!
His eyes flashed open. It had been brief but having heard it once, it became easier to pick up. It wasn't a groan or a moan. It was footsteps: a shuffling gait, like something heavy being dragged across uneven ground.
Now, the soldier was faced with a choice: to step forwards and brave the abyss, or to return once more. He grinned wildly.
Like there was every a choice. What was our motto? Forwards, unto the Abyss! Feels ironic to be recalling that now, but perhaps for me of all people it is most fitting.
And so the Nameless Soldier stepped up from his crouched position. He lifted a foot to stand on the wreckage in front of him and, instinctually, he felt its solid weight beneath his foot and pushed himself up.
Grabbing with his hands, he felt the cool and wet metal, gripping it to haul the rest of himself up. Clenching his hands into fists, the black metal warped under his fingers like tofu.
He had little time to relish in the sensation of pure strength, nor of his newfound ability of partial permanence, as his attention was fully absorbed by what lay before him.
A bone deep chill assaulted him in force as the reality he had been so fervently ignoring forced itself upon his awareness. From this vantage point, he could see far into the distance. He grimaced in an exhausted and jaded horror.
Twisted wreckages, mounds that blocked the horizon, the beady eyes of circling Vultures above. And yet no doubt it extended even further still, beyond his sight. An endless, smoking battlefield.
Yet this alone was not what horrified him. It was not the moving shadows in the distance, the strangely pulsing masses. No. It was something far closer.
The whispers. Their constant presence had become something he was used to by now, filtering it subconsciously. But they had never stopped. Their unholy resentment still flooded his soul with strange power.
And now, they crescendoed, as if proclaiming to him all that they once were. All this destruction. All this death. Funneled into a single soul. For the first time, the Soldier looked down at his warped steel imprinted with his handprints and felt fear.
Fear of what he was becoming, changing into.
Or being changed into. The distinction is meaningless.
He felt the core of his Oath burning within him like a branded imprint, demanding to be acknowledged. It cleared away the deafening, spectral chatter like a solid beam of light chasing away the shadows. Like a ray of sunlight through a break in the clouds.
Like a spike of hatred clawing through the shackles of tranquility. And with that boiling hatred came a remembrance of purpose, renewing him with strength.
Monster? Mutant?
He laughed silently.
The high road was closed to me from the very beginning. If I become an abomination, then so be it. There is no power without a price, and there is no price they can exact that has not already been wrung from my gaunt body.
And so he finally tore his eyes away from the hellish landscape onto the source of the noise in front of him. A shambling monstrosity, it was at least ten feet tall, almost at eye level with him standing atop the obsidian wreckage.
Draped in billowing cloth, its form was indistinct, flashed of moving parts and flowing hydraulics visible in brief instances. Its head was exposed to the elements: a silver hexagonal prism glinting in the brief flashes of illuminating lightning.
Most conspicuous were the massive chains. Wrapped around the monstrosity's torso, they trailed behind it attached to a steel cube almost the same size as the abomination itself. With each arduous step forwards, the cube groaned as it dragged on the floor.
It seemed not to have noticed the soldier, who had been standing there in a daze for sometime before focusing on it. Yet, as though that flicker of intent was somehow tangible, as soon as he did focus, it halted.
It...noticed me?!
The soldier froze in shock, legs slightly bent and spectral muscles tensed. For a few split seconds, there was silence. No-one moved, as if the very world held its breath.
In that darkness, both creatures were still. The soul of the Nameless Soldier a miniscule figure looking down on the abomination from above. Then, with a flash of fractal lightning that illuminated the two beings for an instant, they both burst into motion.
The shambling abomination moved with startling agility, swinging a limb hidden by its billowing cloak. Perhaps any other would have died instantly, not even knowing how. But the spectral vision of the soldier pierced through the darkness like a knife through butter.
He dropped to his stomach as a massive stretch of chain whipped across the air where his head just was. The whip cracked with a thunderous boom leaving an almost visible wake in its path and wrapped back around, disappearing into the folds of the abominations cloak.
The abomination paused for a split second, not feeling the fleshy resistance it no doubt expected.
But that split second was enough.
Too slow.
For the Soul of the Nameless Soldier moved at the speed of thought.