The Last Slann, 2,428 words

From atop the apex of his stepped pyramid the Slann Chosiloqol saw Itza, the First City in flames. The pyramid and the area around it was an island of blue and green defenders surrounded by a sea of attackers in twisted purples, browns, reds, and colors not meant to be viewed by mortals.

Chosiloqol hurled waves of deaths at the minions of Chaos. While the magic was of a scale undreamt of by lesser mortals, the effect hardly caused a ripple in the demonic host. Over a hundred daemons were banished back to the Chaos Realm not to reform again for several centuries. Too little too late. With better range, Chosiloqol could have hit ten times as many foes, but his last Skink Priest vassal had been ripped to pieces hours ago. Firing spells from the top of the pyramid was the best he could do.

Daemons had already enveloped the last of the other fortified pyramids. Chosiloqol (Chose-eey-lo-cole) felt telepathic death screams of the last of several more fellow Slann. It seemed the golden plaque that the Slann decided to hide from the Skinks was coming to fruition. Chosiloqol wondered absently if there were any Skinks left alive to keep the prophecy hidden from. His attendant may have been the last Skink left in the world. The forbidden prophecy foretold that Chosiloqol was to be the last Slann of this world to have his spirit depart his body.

His mind drifted and thought of millennia ago when the Slann discovered that the Old Ones had made their presence felt on many other worlds. The Slann had all agreed they should concentrate on their world as the Old Ones commanded.

This world is doomed, but I can help others. I cannot fight fate, my spirit will depart, but I will not die!

Chosiloqol sensed the determination of his guardians. He had little more than a thousand defenders arrayed against at least a twenty times those numbers. The defenders refused to give up an inch of ground as long as blood flowed through their veins. The Slann reached out telepathically and drank deep of his followers’ loyalty and courage and willed his astral form to ascend.

His Skink attendant cried out in despair as his master’s body slumped forward and the palanquin came crashing down on the temple apex. The distraught Skink didn’t even notice the simultaneous collapse of hundreds of Saurus warriors and Temple Guard. The Daemon hordes paused briefly in confusion at their stroke of luck then promptly swarmed the prone Sauri eviscerating them in frenzied excitement, uncaring whether they were already dead or merely unconscious awaiting death at their hands.

Slann often astrally projected their wills, but never without tethers to their bodies. Chosiloqol had abandoned his physical shell so completely that he wasn’t even aware when a Bloodthirster consumed it. That should have ended his journey, but he was brimming with the power and devotion of the Itza’s strongest and bravest defenders. He locked onto the distant source of the Old One’s presence, and willed his spirit to go in that direction. Unfortunately, his spirit was not the presence in astral space.

Tadpole of the Old Ones. If you had fought and died as a mortal does, your soul might have been able to escape and return to the Old Ones’ realm, assuming it still exists. I foresaw waiting patiently in the astral space of the last temple would be profitable, but I never dreamed I would get to devour the last Slann. I rarely get to feed because my power is too great to manifest on your pathetic world, but now your soul is fully exposed. You will have the honor of being consumed by the Right Hand of Tzeentch!

The spectral daemon threw a blast of pure malice, pure warpflame untainted by having a physical substance. Chosiloqol summoned a cocoon of pure light around himself dissipating the warpflame harmlessly though he knew he couldn’t maintain that defense for long. He telepathically shouted at his foe.

You are the Right Hand of Nothing! I am Chosiloqol of Itza! I was taught the secrets of the universe by the architects of Creation. I have witnessed continents rise and fall. I will be not be consumed by the likes of you!

Your power is nothing compared to me—why are you calling out? There are no allies to come to your aid.

I wasn’t calling allies here.

Hand of Tzeentch! You will not steal the last prize after sitting out the battle. I will claim this prize for Slaanesh.
A pox on all of you! The Slann’s essence will be the fertilizer for new glorious putrescence to define a new age!
Death to all you vile manipulators! Souls for the Blood god!

As the lieutenants of the Dark powers fought, Chosiloqol made his escape. A multitude of astral daemons came when their masters arrived in numbers beyond counting, mostly fighting their daemonic rivals. Though only a fraction of a tithe of the Daemons turned their attention to fleeing Slann, their numbers would have constituted a small army in the physical realm.

Light magic is the most effective magic against Chaos, but the Slann had already drawn upon this magic calling up shields. Now that he was little more than a discorporate mind, he had to balance his magic or he’d weaken his essence. He lashed out with waves of Death and severed several Daemon’s minds from their bodies. Lacking a Slann’s will they could not survive this separation and were lost foreever. Life magic cleared away even more attackers. While it didn’t destroy the Daemons it forced them out of the astral plane back into bodies in the Chaos realms and too far removed to be an immediate threat. Chosiloqol alternated wielding every wind of magic he could until he had finally destroyed, banished, disoriented, or outran every Daemon that sought to bar his way.

Even rationing his magic through the Wandering Deliberations technique, the effort almost exhausted his spirit, literally. What started as a purposeful flight had turned into something of an astral free fall as Chosiqol’s soul plummeted like a meteorite dying on impact on the very world he sought refuge on. He sensed his saviors, foreign Slann created by the Old Ones to oversee their own world.

His distant brethren sensed his approach. Several Slann had astrally projected themselves out to meet Chosiloqol. They gently caught him and shared enough of their spare energy to guide him to their temples.

We do not recognize you brother? From where do you hail?
His mind has been pulled too far from his body.
Without an anchor he will fade soon.
Quick, tell us what news of the Old Ones do you bring before you leave?

I…will…not…leave…

He pulled out mentally taking a tiny portion of the life force of the Slann communicating with it but drew the bulk of his power from the jungle itself using their mightiest temple as a conduit. Chosiloqol willed himself a new physical form to house his formidable will.

First a toad-like skeleton emerged on the Temple apex then slowly it grew sinew, blood, and skin. Within minutes a new Slann lay sprawled on the apex gazing at the stars his spirit once traveled.

Naturally the Skinks were awestruck, not only by the new arrival but by the reaction of their own lords. Never before had they heard of a Slann literally dropping his jaw in astonishment. One of their lords recovered before Chosiloqol did and muttered out loud.

“Only the Slann of the First Spawning could reconstitute their bodies like that…”

The Skinks all stared at him.

“What are you waiting for? Bring forth a palanquin!”

Once he rested and recovered Chosiloqol told his story to the Slann of the land called “Lustria.” Chosiloqol was now in Itza. The second “First City” he had ever had a physical body created in. The Slann had long suspected that the Old Ones had left their mark on many worlds, so Chosiloqol revelation of different spawnings of Slann on a distant world were not alarming. What was alarming that the Old Ones’ Great Plan could fail on any world.

Many Slann wanted to discuss the paradox of two “First Cities”, but Chosiloqol wouldn’t stand for it.
Now is not the time for contemplation. Now is the time for action. My brethren were too slow to save our world, but we have the opportunity to act before this Itza, this First City, becomes the Last City. Before this world becomes the Last World.
When news came that the Skaven were reemerging in Lustria, Chosiloqol stunned all of his hosts by insisting on taking command personally. Even Mazdamundi was rarely this aggressive. He surprised everyone again when he delayed a direct confrontation and had skirmish forces harry the Skaven towards Quetza, the Defiled City. Skink priests and Oldbloods alike quietly questioned the outlander Slann’s mental acuity. Surely the ratmen would have the advantage in the Defiled City.

Once reaching the outskirts of the Defiled City, Chosiqol bid his army to halt. He addressed the commanders.

“We don’t want to risk our forces being tainted by the lingering pestilence here.”

Then encased by a warm cocoon of white light, the outlander Slann floating his palanqin away from his guardians and soldiers and floated towards the center of the ruined city.

While many of the commanders privately had misgivings about the foreign Slann’s plan, none dared to question him. While Chosiloqol fulfilled his inscrutable plan, the Saurus and Skink leaders prepared battlelines as their scouts had reported the Skaven army neared.

Visibility was unusually good because the lingering taint of the Defiled City had thinned out the local foliage. Despite this, their foul foes could be heard and smelled well before they could be seen. A force of ratmen four times that of what the First had assembled. The Skaven army was no mere band of wretches. It included many mutated abominations and mechanical monstrosities to match their scaly counterparts many beasts of war. This would not be an easy battle but the First Children of the Old Ones had triumphed over Skaven facing far worse odds than this.

“For Sotek!” the Skinks, Sauri, and Kroxigor yelled as one. The Anathema answered with their own snarling battle cries. As the two armies surged across the field towards each other both paused for a split second in confusion when an unearthly wail came from beyond their western flanks.

From the midst of the Defiled city rank after rank of skeletons emerged. Fallen Skaven, Sauri, and Skinks picked up rusted weapons and formed a massive host outnumbering the Lizardmen and Skaven armies combined. These dead warriors were joined by skeletal Kroxigors forming ranks with skeletal Rat Ogres and less recognizable skeletons. The skeletal remains of giant rats scuttled forward along with the spike covered skeletons of Razordon. All the skeletons moved with nary a sound other than the creaking of bones and the clank of rusting armaments. None of them had wailed.

The source of the wailing became apparent as blue and purple spectral forms emerged walking through the skeleton cohorts. The spirits emitted cries of pain in Saurian and Queekish alike. The spectral Skinks all bore bulbous sores of infections or other grotesque mutations bearing witness to the Skaven’s worst poisons. A few Skaven spirits, slaves by the look of them, had similar mutations upon their spectral forms, but most of the Skaven spirits showcased the worst of what Lustria had to offer its enemies: the scorched bodies of Salamander victims, swollen limbs from Skaven hit by poisoned darts and left to die over the course of hours, Skaven who had been slain by hundreds of tiny bites from snakes, bloated victims of drowning.

The First were not about to let the arrival of a horde of undead stop them from fulfilling their duty, the Saurus and Skink commanders ordered their charge anew, figuring they’d attack the undead after slaying their hated foes. Before the Saurus warriors could reach the Skaven’s frontlines the wailing specters hit them first. The Skaven warlocks struck down a few but on the whole the ratmen were totally unprepared for screaming incorporeal creatures slicing into their army center.

The Skaven lines buckled as the Saurus and Skink Cohorts charged into them. Minutes later the skeletons had followed the specters into the fray. Pincered between two armies, the Skaven broke into a rout only to discover a skeletal Carnosaur, somehow still able to roar impressively despite having no lungs appear behind them cutting off their retreat. The incorporeal soldiers, still wailing in agony fanned out to catch fleeing stragglers.

With the Skaven obliterated, The Scar Veterans and Skink Chiefs prepared to reform their battle lines against the undead menace until one of the Skink Priests shrieked.

“Stop!”

The undead horde closed ranks and stood to attention. The remaining quiet Skaven corpses all rose anew and were absorbed into the undead army. From behind the dark force rose a palanquin.

Chosiloqol floated his palanquin forward towards the Lizardmen ranks as the undead parted for him. He turned quietly to the ranking Saurus general

“Very few of our troops were lost today. If you held back completely like I ordered we would have lost nothing. That’s why we let the dead fight for us.”

He addressed the whole army magically amplifying his voice, simultaneously projecting his message telepathically to Slann for hundreds of miles.

“With this magic we will turn the very bodies of the Anathema into tools of the Old One’s will! I have prevented the end times of our world!”

The Kroxigor cheered listening to his tone alone and marveling that a Slann had bothered to say something encouraging. The Skink Priests and those around them cheered loudly, but the applause from the bulk of the Sauri and Skinks was fairly tepid. They weren’t all entirely sure they liked what they heard. In their stepped pyramids temples the Slann shuddered as they tried to gather and control the new magical energies they felt released.

Few wizards among the lesser races sensed anything at all given their weaker power and greater distance relative to the Slann, but an ocean away one wizard felt the winds of magic stir. In a pyramid very much unlike those of Lustria, Arkhan the Black felt the barrier between life and death quiver under the Slann's distant unleashing. If he still had flesh on his face, he would have smiled. Nagash’s final resurrection was surely nigh.

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This is kind of a multiverse of Madness story. I wrote this piece to bulk up entries for the Lustria-Online October-November 2015 Short Story Contest.
For context, this was when Games Workshop started off their End Times books and I instantly became fond of the Lore of Undeath and the ability to have Lizardmen summon undead units.
One WHF universe died and one Slann survived it's fall and transplanted himself to another. The new Slann brought with him a new way of doing things, a way considered more than a little blasphemous by the Lizardmen of that universe.