On the Cruelty of Gods
Academic Imogen Temult/Judicator Otohan Thull; Critical Role
Anyone remember that huge AU @inomakani and I have been cooking up for the better part of two years?
Tags and Opening Lines under the cut; link to fic in the title!
Above ground, Vasselheim’s Duskmeadow district is cloaked by the haze of a rain-soaked new moon night. The Raven’s Crest temple stands proudly at the district’s center, spearing through the fog and eerily still, towers devoid of ringing bells and croaking corvids. Cramped dwellings and shops surround the temple, sprawled out like penitents bowed before a throne. Four individuals silently slink through twisting alleyways and across muddy streets, heading for the cathedral, and what lies beneath.
Below ground, the catacombs expand endlessly. It is a labyrinth of earthen tunnels fortified by stone—low ceilings and damp, chilly air contrasted by elegantly carved archways and mosaic floors.
To the naked eye, the halls are lit only intermittently by torchlight, with long stretches of darkness between each sconce. Celestial, cerulean flames flicker but never sputter out, casting shadows across rows of alcoves dug into the walls, where the dead rest eternally.
To the eyes of the judicator, however, everything glows.
Intricate strings of technicolor glyphs adorn the architecture—weaving between the seams of every stone, climbing along the columns like creeping vines, and bathing the floor in a sea of ambient magic.
Though the catacombs are alive with every color of the light spectrum and even some outside of it, the bodies interred here are merely that: desiccated skin, flaking scales, old bones. Dead things wrapped in plain funeral shrouds and devoid of magic, they appear as pockets of emptiness amidst the vibrant current of drifting arcana.
Rarely, a pure white sphere of light can be seen peeking through the gaps of a rib cage—a single dim star caged by ancient magics far stronger than mere bone. The bodies along with the catacombs they call home are veiled by powerful wards that safeguard the sanctity of life even in death, deterring any that would attempt to defile the natural order. Even so, though death comes for all, the Matron is merciful. There is always a choice, and some stars simply refuse to fade even within a prison of their own making.
It would be a beautiful sight, were its sole witness capable of acknowledging the existence of beauty.
The judicator’s body is nearly as still as the dead surrounding it, itself wreathed in even older magics—magic born in the Age of Arcanum and honed in the forge of the Calamity. Its gaze, though concealed behind a featureless brass mask, takes in the scene before it dispassionately.
The judicator has no concept of beauty, only function. Purpose.
The wards hold. They are functional. They serve their purpose.
