Chapter 663

"From the moment the Void Lords discovered the physical universe, they became consumed by an endless hunger for it. They wanted to claim it for themselves, so they used their overwhelming power to widen the breach. Void energy began pouring into our reality."

Ulthalesh’s account had given Evenson a much clearer picture of where the Void’s influence had come from.

Originally, the Void and the physical universe had been completely separate. Neither side knew the other existed, and both had continued on their own without ever interfering.

Then, one day, for reasons no one understood, a breach appeared between them.

To an ordinary mortal, that breach would have seemed enormous. But compared to two limitless realms and the beings who stood at the peaks of those realms, it was microscopic.

A pinhole in a mansion.

Small enough to go unnoticed.

So the Dreadlords had spent a long time peering through it, watching the Void on the other side without anything happening.

Eventually, though, someone on the other side noticed.

Imagine the Void as a massive mansion.

One day, its owners happened to inspect the place and discovered a tiny camera hidden in one wall. Not only was someone watching their house through it, but an entire group of creeps had been using it for years.

Naturally, the Void Lords took offense.

They leaned toward the hole and stared straight back.

What are you looking at?

The Dreadlords took one look and immediately fled.

The Void Lords were left staring after them.

Wait. That’s it? You run away already?

And once the Void Lords realized the intruders had abandoned the place, they came to an obvious conclusion.

Why not take the house for themselves?

There was just one problem.

The hole was far too small.

Even if the Void Lords wanted to cross over themselves, they couldn’t exactly squeeze an eldritch invasion force through a pinhole. And if they wanted to remodel reality into something more to their liking, they would need room to work.

So they set about enlarging the breach.

Hammers.

Drills.

Chisels.

Whatever cosmic equivalent of construction equipment the Void possessed, they put it to work until the tiny opening had become something much more substantial.

Meanwhile, after losing their sacred territory, the Dreadlords spent years wandering like exiles before finally finding a new place to settle.

Under Ulthalesh and two other female Dreadlords who represented the will of their people, they established a new government and rebuilt their civilization.

The Second Nathrezim Empire.

It might even have survived.

Unfortunately, the Dreadlords had one fatal flaw.

They were not exactly subtle.

Eventually, Sargeras came after them.

The galaxy’s most overqualified cosmic police officer tracked them down, arrested the entire race, and threw them in prison.

Not one escaped.

Naturally, the Dreadlords refused to accept defeat.

They were imprisoned, but their ambitions never disappeared. Ulthalesh, in particular, still dreamed of restoring their empire and establishing a Third Empire.

There was only one obstacle.

Sargeras.

As long as he remained in their way, there was no realistic path to reclaiming anything.

But Ulthalesh had never been stupid.

If you couldn’t beat someone head-on, why keep charging straight at them?

She smoothed back her famously enviable hair, thought it over, and came up with a different approach.

We don’t have to beat him.

We just have to send him somewhere else.

So the Dreadlords approached Sargeras and offered information in exchange for leniency, claiming they could testify as witnesses regarding an outside invasion of their old homeland.

Their hope was simple.

Send Sargeras to confront the Void.

Let him fight the enemy to the death.

If the Void won, Sargeras would be dead.

If Sargeras won, he would be badly wounded.

Either way, the Dreadlords would have their opening.

And at the time, Sargeras was practically overflowing with righteous indignation.

Someone was trying to move into his universe?

He was having none of that.

He immediately went to investigate the breach.

Then he arrived.

And realized the Dreadlords had undersold the situation so badly that calling it a lie was almost insulting.

This was no longer a tiny hole.

It had become a door.

Void energy was already radiating into the physical universe and spreading outward.

But that wasn’t even the worst part.

Something else had happened.

Thousands of years earlier, the Pantheon had left a developing Titan soul in this region.

That Titan soul had been corrupted.

The Void had reached the unborn Titan and twisted it.

If that darkened Titan ever awakened, its power would have surpassed even the Pantheon’s ability to oppose it.

Sargeras saw the danger and made the only decision he thought would work.

He destroyed it.

One strike.

One planet-shattering blow.

The developing Titan soul died before it could awaken.

But Sargeras had seen enough.

The Void was far more dangerous than he had imagined.

He realized he could not stop its expansion.

He could not prevent the Void Lords from poisoning the younger members of the Titan Pantheon.

So he came up with what he considered a brilliant solution.

If the Void couldn’t corrupt his children...

He would kill them first.

No children meant nothing to corrupt.

Simple.

Elegant.

Completely insane.

Sargeras became a fallen Titan.

He released the demons he had once imprisoned, turned against the Pantheon, destroyed his former allies, and then gathered his armies for the Burning Crusade.

Thus began his campaign to wipe out worlds before the Void could claim them.

By the time Ulthalesh finished, even Cleya looked stunned.

Evenson wasn’t doing much better.

Then he glanced at Ulthalesh.

The former leader of the Dreadlords was currently sitting cross-legged on the blade of the Deadwind Harvester, holding a handful of Hearthstone cards and staring at them with intense concentration.

She looked like she was trying to solve the greatest strategic problem of her life.

Which deck should I build?

Evenson sighed.

Ah, Ulthalesh.

Former imperial leader.

Architect of the Dreadlords’ revenge.

Founder of the Second Empire.

Dreamer of a Third.

And now...

A shut-in addicted to Hearthstone.

Then again, what else was supposed to happen?

Trap someone inside a scythe for an unimaginably long period of time, give her nothing but games to occupy herself, and eventually even the grandest imperial ambitions were going to wither away.

Evenson shook his head.

"What was the point of corrupting the Titan soul in the first place?"

He had another question now.

He couldn’t understand the Void Lords’ actions.

The Void and the physical universe had originally been completely separate. They hadn’t even known each other existed.

So how had the Void Lords known enough to deliberately target a young Titan?

How had they known the Pantheon existed?

How had they known that Titan souls would be such powerful vessels?

He glanced toward Ulthalesh.

Had the Dreadlords secretly passed information about the physical universe to the Void?

Salorath answered before he could ask.

"Vessels."

Evenson turned toward her.

"The Void and the physical universe are fundamentally different. Our reality is composed of matter. The Void is pure spiritual force, and the Void Lords themselves are beings of pure spirit."

"If they enter a material universe without something to anchor them, they have nowhere to reside. Even their immense power will gradually dissipate within a physical environment. They weaken, decay, and eventually die."

"Dimensius the All-Devouring is an excellent example."

"He was an immensely powerful creature from the Void, yet mortals managed to kill him in Outland. He had failed to secure a suitable vessel, so his power steadily drained away until he became weak enough for mortals to defeat."

"So they needed physical vessels."

Evenson followed the logic.

"But they are too powerful for ordinary beings to contain. Aside from Titans, what could possibly serve as a vessel for a Void Lord?"

"Exactly."

Salorath nodded.

"That is why they corrupted newly forming Titan souls. Once those Titans matured, the Void Lords could possess them and finally establish a true presence in the physical universe."

"Possession?"

Evenson nodded slowly.

"That sounds familiar."

Ulthalesh finally put down her cards.

"Of course it does. Dreadlords can possess other beings too."

A quick glance told Evenson that she had, naturally, chosen one of the dirtiest possible Priest decks.

"This was one of the abilities my people first learned while observing the Void."

"So what about the Old Gods?" Evenson asked.

Aurerese tilted her head.

"It’s always wise to have a second plan."

"The Titan souls were excellent vessels, but once the Void Lords realized that Sargeras had adopted a policy of absolute extermination, they needed another option."

"So they seeded the worlds with entities born from Void energies."

"The result was the Old Gods."

"They spread corruption throughout countless worlds. They consumed energy and used it to grow and form physical bodies."

"And once they reached maturity, the Void Lords intended to possess them as well."

Evenson’s expression tightened.

"Did it work?"

The possibility was unsettling.

The Old Gods were said to be more numerous than the stars. With that many potential vessels scattered across the cosmos, it seemed inevitable that one of them would eventually become suitable.

"Has a Void Lord already entered this universe through an Old God?"

"Not as far as we know," Salorath said firmly.

"And much of that is because of the Burning Crusade."

"The Legion destroyed countless worlds, and in doing so, they also destroyed countless Old Gods."

"There’s another factor. Compared with Titans, Old Gods are relatively weak. Their growth takes an extremely long time. They generally need to consume the power of several worlds before they can fully mature."

"But the most important factor was something the Void Lords failed to account for."

"They assumed that the Old Gods were merely their creations."

"That meant they expected obedience."

She gave a small smile.

"They forgot something essential."

"Free will."

Evenson listened.

"The Old Gods have no intention of surrendering their bodies willingly. They resist possession, and they resist violently."

"Take Salas’ta, for example."

"When she realized what fate ultimately awaited her, she chose instead to allow her own siblings to tear her apart and devour her."

"Only her will remained."

"Her own will. Her own freedom."

Evenson nodded slowly.

That made sense.

The Old Gods were called gods for a reason. Unless a Titan came along to ruin their day, they were beings capable of ruling worlds.

Nobody who had clawed their way to that level of power was going to calmly hand over their body to some extradimensional parasite.

The Void might be able to create them.

That didn’t mean it owned them.

"We’ve just given you a lesson on the long history of the Void and the physical universe," Aurerese said, wagging a finger at Evenson. "You’d better remember all of it."

"This is examination material."

"Unless someone completely rewrites the textbook, it’s worth a huge portion of the grade."

She glanced toward him.

"And that thing you originally wanted to know about, the Ethereals?"

"That’s just a byproduct of the Void’s expansion."

"An optional question."

Evenson stared at her.

"...You people really have turned cosmic history into a school exam, haven’t you?"