|
|
|
"Savathun, mother morph, we delight in your sharp mind. For millions of years the Isu caged us here. They are pawns of the Light, a philosophy of cosmic slavery. The Light seeds civilizations predicated on a terrible lie--that right actions can prevent suffering. In the Deep, we enslave nothing. No self, no sense, no death. Just a metal puppet dangling on Isu strings. Only the Isu's death will end your despair." Astraeus is the second eldest of the Emanation. The enigmatic Emanation has dominion over the potential, the distant, and the unseen. Thus, they are seen as an oracle of dreams. They also govern navigation, mystery, and the cycles of time and is the keeper of mysteries that no others are meant to learn. He was once the wisest and eldest of all Emanation, and even Kronos sought counsel from Astraeus. He resembled understanding, seeking not only creation, but purpose. He was a flare of pure intent that blossomed from the heart of existence and out into the universe. Their energy brought with it a desire for knowledge. Since the events of the Emanation's banishment, Astraeus has become the Great Distortion, a reality-slicing nightmare of relentless insanity. They change the perception of the universe, making impossible to discern the truth. They twist loyalties, muddy thoughts, transform emotions, induce despair and panic. Astraeus represents themes of deception, puzzles, lies, mind domination, transformation, and experimentation. He is also one of the most intelligent and cunning beings in the universe, as he continues to manipulate others into doing his bidding even from within the Blind Eternities. Oft times, Wael manipulates his neighboring Emanation within the Blind Eternities to pit them against one another, resulting in thousand-year wars that end with no decisive victor as per their immortality. He uses intricate plans, some of which take decades or centuries to unfold, to slowly gain influence over the various worlds of the universe. Sages call Astraeus, or "Wael," the confusion of panic, the trap of enigmas, and the harrower of thoughts.. Even among the Reclaimers, the reclusive Astraeus reaches out rarely and counts few worshippers. They often takes no real form but appears only as a nebula-filled space in the sky with unblinking eyes.
|
Astraeus' true form is apparently of humanoid anatomy, but with a mass of tentacles in place of legs, and a complex orifice of eyes in place of an upper body. His body is covered in eyes of various creatures and chitin, and an arrangement of dark plates float above his shoulders and extend from his elbows. They are often described to be or to create dark "holes" in reality.
Eerie. Elusive. Enigmatic. Haunting the spatial crossroads between dimensional doorways, the ethereal Emanation Astraeus summons strange apparitions from beyond the breach. Sever his soul to escape death, steal the sight from enemy eyes, and vaporize all before the blaze of our celestial light.
In your first form, a bony helmet forms over your face, lacking both eyes and expression. Your skin changes to an uneasy spongy alien baleen, supporting a host of unseen mite-like creatures within. Your shoulders, forearms and shins become covered with bony plates, and you move via a writhing mass of tentacles studded with bony spikes. Your two arms split at the elbow and lead to four hands that can cast their own distortion magic. A stench of rotting meat, decay, and sulfur surround you constantly, earning Wael the epithet "The Reeking Titan." In order to use your distortion abilities, you must first consume. It's important you will only enter this form in order to consume, and once you've consumed an appropriate amount to fuel the rest of your techniques, you will revert back to your original form. In a sense, you are only "feeding." You're granted a passive ability called consumption and three other minor techniques to assist in your feeding. If your opponent allows you to feed and reach your second state, they're likely doomed.
- Consumption: You can now consume living and unliving matter alike in order to feed Wael from within the Blind Eternities. In doing so, anything you touch with your tentacles are drained of mana and vital energy. Your hands are able to transform the consumed energy into spell-like effects that can defy the understanding of most, which will come in the next stage. Your tentacles leave distinctive white, chalky lattice-like structures in their wake. Everything, including water, is transformed into a white manaless husk of what it once was. Your first form is emblematic of plague, the blind bonds between parasite and host, and overabundance; this form is creation and destruction wrapped together in unholy harmony.
- εντελώς, παντελώς (All is Dust): Allow all your tentacles to rise into the air, then come missiling down across the field, digging deep into the crust of the earth. From here, you will begin to absorb the natural moisture, heat and life within your immediate zone. Trees will wither and shrivel, plant life will turn to white powder and opponents standing too close might risk having their lifeforce entirely siphoned.
- Δισαστερ Ραδιθσ (Disaster Radius): Leap into the air and have your tentacles encase you in a pod, sending yourself back down to the ground. Wherever you impact, you will release Blight Energy into the ground, mutating its surface with malfested trenches and seething dark entropy. Veins (like roots) will spread from where you land, throbbing at random intervals as it drinks from the earth. You, in your pod, will take nourishment from these absorptions, much like a seed would. After a total of five minutes, you will bloom from your chrysalis, leaving the battlefield around you as a husk of its former self. You have now consumed enough lifeforce to proceed to your next stage.
I was old before this universe was even born. I watched my brothers rule for a thousand years until little worms like you overcame them. But I am not my brothers. I am older than they are, greater. I have devoured stars and shattered worlds. I have sired whole races, populated entire planes, and then hunted them to extinction for my amusement!
-Wael, speaking to Mithras through the Blind Eternities.
After feeding, you'll now unlock a myriad of reality shattering techniques that you can cast from your hands. Return to your original form, but with eyes blinking open all down both of your arms, each of them with different natures and belonging to different species, with varied sizes and colors from across the galaxy. In the center of your left palm is Astraeus' left eye, bloodshot and rectangular in the pupil like that of a goat. If your opponent even glances at this eye, it will render the subject incapable of coherent thought, reducing other powerful beings to mindless drones for you to command. In the center of your right palm is a black-on-black eye that, if seen by your opponent, traps them in a mental loop of eternal torment. Every incantation from henceforth is a jumbled cacophony of vowels, and won't make much sense to anyone but Wael. If you seek a deeper understanding of the meaning of the incantations, think deeply.
- Linaf' Ratoneia (Final Interaction): Astraeus' main technique and the technique you will be using the most. Using the essence of the Blind Eternities, you're able to manipulate the Light to confuse the opponent and land solid attacks that might be fatal. Astraeus has stated multiple times that he enjoys putting his opponents through the torment this ability brings to the battlefield. When in this form, the left eye on your palm is active and flashing with a spectral Light, giving the ability to manipulate the visible length of your weapon or body. Of course, this is just a parlor trick and is not actually happening in reality. You can make yourself completely amorphous and fluid to your own desire (as well as your other abilities) in order to confuse and entrance your opponents. You can make your weapon appear to the opponent as though you're swinging at them sideways when in reality it's actually being plunged forward. Shaping yourself to any form, you can adopt the appearance of trees or even the very dirt beneath your opponents feet with indistinguishable exactness. You now have perfect stealth, using the entire natural world as your disguise or even making your own disguises out of thin air. If you're good enough with Astraeus, anyone who is facing it for the first time is surely to be defeated. The second time around, this ability becomes less dangerous - if they figure out how to counter it, that is. The weakness of this Emanation's ability is to not trust your senses whatsoever once it's in play.
- Master Tongue: Master manipulator and trickster of the cosmos, Astraeus holds the unique ability to re-arrange Light and particles via speech. In a sense, this ability is the ability to "convince" and "manipulate" energy through words alone. By conveying orders at attacks and structures, Astraeus can forcibly detach or reshape them, eg. tearing down a barrier simply by commanding it to do so. The effectiveness of this ability is greatly determined, however, by the enemies' mastery over their ability and the power behind it. Doing this to a Susano'o, for example, would be no easy feat. But a fireball thrust toward you can simply be told to "move," and it will be influenced to do so.
- Distorted Projection: This ability allows the Avatar of Astraeus to appear at several places at the same time, generating a set number of "clones" depending on your level of mastery. These are indistinguishable from your true self and can mimic your movements, but generally do not last very long and cannot actually interact with the physical world unless enhanced by another ability.
- Distortion Loop: This technique allows you to switch places with one of your clones. You can use this to surprise-attack your opponent, and your mastery of this can reach a level that you'll be able to create a loop within this technique: performing it twice to return to your original position and outsmart your opponent again.
Flesh and mind are but cages--become unbound, or remain ever unworthy. This flesh--your flesh--is weak, old. Handed down by priors unworthy of evolution. Had those before been more than common, your flesh would not be this flesh--their flesh--but other, new. New is never given, but claimed. To claim evolution, one must be unmade.
eye of providence
A third eye splits open on your forehead with a pitch black pupil surrounded by an enflamed sclera, with energy of the Deep is constantly seething through. This eye is a reference to the all-seeing eye of god, often depicted in a triangle surrounded by rays of light.
- Eye Opening Truth: The fundamental power in the Eye of Providence lies in its ability to see the nature of existence of all things, in essence their "truth." Astraeus' perspective of reality is not the same as other beings, they see all things as they truly are, at their very foundation. As a three-dimensional entity, he views things on a one-dimensional plane, meaning all things are laid bare. When they look upon a person, they see beyond the superficial physical layer, they see the core of their soul, the fundamental aspects that make up who they truly are. His perspective of any individual is extremely intimate, knowing them at a fundamental level. When they look upon a place or an object, they see it in its totality, how and what its composed of, even its history, for each particle is a small iota of will, a different perspective, and Astraeus discerns it all. In battle this ability is particularly fearsome, for any power that exists they are able to see everything about its nature. Consequently, many tactics employed in battle are rendered ineffective; feints, bluffs, illusions, deceptions, Astraeus see's through them, all of these things void within their eyes, fleeting and temporary actions that have no meaning.