I sit.
The throne beneath me is black stone, veins of silver twisting like frozen lightning.
The hooded servants lie prostrate, foreheads pressed to the marble, repeating my words without end.
"Perhaps the fastest way to reach the heavens may be by climbing a salt mountain."
They echo it.
I do not answer. I do not need to.
My body trembles faintly, though no one would notice.
It was never made to hold what my mind has claimed.
I skipped the steps others endure.
I leaped.
And now the flesh decays.
Each breath carries a burden it cannot bear.
I rise.
The corridors stretch before me, arches soaring like dark ribs into the sky. Marble floors hum faintly beneath my steps.
The mansion itself vibrates with Arcanum Vitae, threads of unseen energy weaving through walls, floors, ceilings, whispering faintly of distant islands and the city that bends beneath me.
Servants in black and gold venetian style attires glide past me silently, careful not to disturb the space I occupy. I do not see them. They exist only as part of the world, nothing more.
I head to the the garden.
Black roses line the paths, petals tipped with silver, quivering faintly with the hum of energy.
Do you feel it?
Life itself pulses through every petal, indifferent to those who call it beauty.
Small pools of black water reflect the eternal night above, stars like shards of glass scattered across a velvet sky, rippling faintly with my presence.
The wind carries faint ozone, and the sharp tang of metal, mingling with the hum of the flowers.
I stop at the largest pool.
My reflection stares back: silver eyes, dark skin, long locs falling into a flowing ponytail. Form perfect. Posture absolute.
And yet… the body is a cage.
Do you see it?
The strain behind my eyes. The tremor in a hand that should not tremble. The pulse that lags behind thought.
Even power has limits. Even perfection burdens.
The city stretches below, floating islands drifting in eternal night. Lights flicker, restless, like creatures too large to comprehend. Threads of energy tether them, invisible to most, connecting the seats of power that govern this place.
I do not judge. It simply exists.
Do you see it?
The beauty that conceals fractures. The splendor that hides decay.
Do you feel the weight pressing against all things, carried quietly by beings too weak to notice?
I step along the rose-lined paths.
They hum louder, entwining with the pulse in my veins, the tremor beneath my feet. Every step, every breath reminds me: flesh cannot follow thought.
The mansion quivers lightly, tied to the city by unseen threads, suspended as I am suspended—between power and collapse.
Even now, distant voices rise from the city. The great houses convene. The Primarch election approaches. Ambition stirs like a low tide, and I… I am its shadow, unwanted but impossible to ignore.
I could stop. I could obey mortality. But that is not enough.
I must go further.
I must transcend.
I must...live.
Every glance at the eternal night, every pulse in my veins, every vibration of the black roses reminds me: this body was never meant to hold what I have claimed.
Do you understand?
Do you see how perfection demands suffering? How even those who touch it too early are broken by it?
Do you notice the quiet threads that bind this city, the unseen powers waiting to move, the distant islands where the others sit, anticipating the next moment?
I do.
I feel it in every hum of the mansion, in every ripple of water, in every vibration beneath my feet.
And still I walk.
The night stretches above, silent.
The mansion floats, silent.
And I… endure, caught between flesh and eternity, waiting for the moment when the body no longer restrains.