“Good morning, class, and welcome to your first lesson in Decay Lord logistics!”
Kuta and Arkay were completely alone in the observatory. Several chairs and desks were set up, not to mention a large, plastic white board, but there was no one else around.
“Excuse me?” Kuta couldn’t help but ask. “This all seems excessive for just me. Especially when I have telepathic powers and can siphon information off olanets and the like.”
Arkay looked Kuta up and down, then shrugged. “What’s the top level domain then for Decay Lord sites?”
“Uh…”
“Exactly!” Arkay tutted. “Although, if I’m really honest, I’m still not really sure why Galyn is so insistent that we teach you. Yeah, yeah, we have to stay together and all that, but still… There’s stuff Galyn didn’t really teach us, and maybe I’ll be able to rectify that at least…” Arkay paused. “I’m getting sidetracked. You have a lot to learn in a short space of time.”
“Like what?”
“Like who you should and should not trust!”
Arkay snapped his fingers and a thick black pen appeared in his hand. He turned to the whiteboard and started scribbling.
“First though, a history lesson of sorts. There aren’t many constants out here in the Periuniversal Void. Distances are genuinely meaningless and have to be measured in some form of time. There are only three constants out here and they all suck…” Arkay glanced over to Kuta. “Care to guess what they are?”
Kuta thought for a moment. “Uh… life, death, light and dark?”
“Not a bad guess. Creation, Void, Time. Everything else is just a remnant of those three. And representing those three constants are three…” Arkay grunted. “I don’t want to call them factions, because they’re all splintered into their own groups. But essentially, you have these, uh, species, which embody those three constants. Life Goddesses embody Creation, and spend their free time making universes and minions to serve them. Voidborns, as you can guess by the name, embody the Void, because they were born in it. Time is embodied by the obviously-named Time Drakes, and they flitter between Creation and Void, giving everything a forward flow. Anything else is just a side effect of those three all vaguely co-existing.”
“And where do we come in?” Kuta asked. “What even IS a Decay Lord? And what is that corruption stuff you mentioned when you put me in that hot box?”
“Well, corruption is just all-round bad…” Arkay explained. “Corruption is basically when that creative spark gets… too creative.
“Oh. So basically, it is cancer?”
“Yep.”
“And what about… us?”
“We’re side-effects of the messy relationship between Void, Creation and Time. The downside of both the Life Goddesses and the Voidborns want their little minions to serve and worship them. So in the creation of universes and everything in between, you get wanted and unwanted beings. Divine Guardians are wanted beings, bound to Life Goddesses. Generally gods or former gods who protect the Life Goddesses as mostly unwilling servants. Anyone else is considered a Decay Lord, an unwanted deity with little to do and too many negative stereotypes thrown at them. Hence why everyone wants to kill us.”
“What?” Kuta gasped. “Everyone wants to kill us?”
“Not everyone, but, well, most beings. Many would be happy to mind-rape or enslave us instead.” Arkay frowned. “I’ll be honest with you, I’m being rather biased here. But I’ve been out here for approximately one Rethan year now and, well, the only beings that didn’t want me dead, enslaved, raped or sold to the highest bidder were Decay Lords. And not all of them agreed on even that.”
“But… why?”
Arkay sighed as he made his way over to Kuta and leaned on his desk. “You’re a Rethavok. You were raised by the worst Rethavok around. But the Rethavok overall are vaguely decent beings that believe in a common good. There’s no such thing as a common good out here, it’s every vok for themselves. Made worse by the fact that the majority lack a standard moral compass. Sadly, out here, that means the assholes rise to the top. ”
Kuta sank in his seat, not really liking what he was hearing. “That… that is…”
“Depressing, I know. There is some good to be found, but, well, I just don’t want you to be as naive as I’ve been.”
“Well…” Kuta smiled, just a little. “Probably a good thing you are teaching me then…”