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I sigh, my voice filling the empty chasm in which I sit, twirling a blade on my finger. Its blue sheen illuminates the sprawling chamber.
I have been considering what to do about them for nearly an hour and still have yet to discover a plan that satisfies me.
On one hand, I would love to watch the forward-marching orcs and elves destroy each other in a violent confrontation.
I want to drink their blood as it flows freely outward onto the dry desert sands. Blood is so much more satisfying when it’s pulled free from the living, earned through sheer brutality and force. This loaned blood barely satisfies anymore.
I could easily turn them against each other if they don’t naturally seek each other out. The tempers of elves and orcs are easily toyed with. Ingrained in their deep prejudices, their minds form conspiracies that readily draw their blades.
On the other hand, their mere existence annoys me. They are hardly worthy of effort or spectacle. These unimpressive bands could simply be pulled from reality, and their loss would leave no chasm.
This is my territory. Hundreds of years ago, I claimed this cavern for myself, pulling it free from demons and dragons that had infiltrated its walls.
I should not have to share it with anybody… let alone the arrogant, rambling elves, or the dull-minded, savage orcs. They contribute nothing to my joy of existence, save for the thought of their untimely deaths.
My vision zooms through the desert, over dunes and steep hills, returning to me.
I know that any subversion of their inevitable fate is a mercy, and I don’t deal in mercies. They are going to die for their trespasses. That much is guaranteed.
And while I can pretend to savor their deaths more if it’s ironic and delayed, I’m offering them kindness by simply killing them today.
“But how to do it?”
The fluttering, empty eyes of the skulls float toward me, and I wish I could imbue life in them so that they could offer suggestions. Unfortunately, there are some laws of mortality that even I can not toy with.
Once something is dead, dead it remains. Though there are some who might unnaturally tamper with that law, their efforts have rarely been rewarded with anything other than death.
At their heart, the skulls are mere decorations, meant for my eyes alone. Though I treat them as companions, their presence here is little more than a warning to those unlucky enough to cross my path.
I lift my foot up, leaving the pools of flowing water that swirl around me to sink back into the indent, where blood and water course separately, spinning erratically. Then I shake my feet, drawing the water and blood back toward the cavern floor.
I snap my fingers, and the fluids return to the rocks, shooting forward through the air and wedging themselves into cracks in the wall. Viscous streams of red jet upward along transparent streams, catching the light of blue flames from wandering skulls.
The cracks vanish as the rush of fluids ceases in every trajectory. I am left alone with my thoughts, hearing only the fluttering of skulls.
It’s true that I could kill the trespassers now, in this very instant.
I could snap to their minds, and in a flash, turn their very thoughts against them.
Or I could even destroy their brains from within, causing miserable aneurysms.
There would be riots as the camps struggled to understand the deaths. If I did it to the orcs, perhaps they could even blame it on elven magic and do my job for me. Simple creatures have often mistaken the powers of divinity for magic.
If I did it to the elves, they may turn against each other or blame the gods. Both would be equally satisfactory.
It would incite a war.
I feel myself smiling wryly at the thought, although not as gleefully as I would like.
In pouring through my memories, I realize that I’ve done that before. Several times, actually. Throughout my centuries of existence, I have repeatedly used my powers to trick easily misled mortal minds. And while every war is satisfying to behold, the joy I draw from playing mortals against each other has diminished. It has become dull and uninteresting with repetition.
What’s more, every time I project my mind into the distance, it taxes me further. And that tax takes time to repay. I could take all my effort, wiping out every intruder individually, and I would be left in recovery for decades.
I might be immortal, but I’m far from indestructible.
My eyes take in the blue flames of the skulls one more time, and I make a decision.
“Fire,” I say aloud. “They shall perish by fire this time.”
