Pilus began painting runes onto Gavrus’s chest with an unknown melted silver metal. If he hadn’t had the Deaden Pain rune, Gavrus suspected the pain would have been excruciating. Instead, it just stung uncomfortably, making a nauseating smell as it burned his skin.

“I have to say you are dealing with this part rather well.” Pilus said to Gavrus, who was still gagged. “Historically, when the ritual was done, we used to have to paint the runes directly over the chakra. And let me tell you, those are some places that would be much more uncomfortable than your chest. Now, we have more advanced runes that can connect to the chakra from anywhere on the body. Though, we still must worry about it interfering with your existing inscriptions. That’s why it’s best to avoid the arms and legs.”

Gavrus saw that the man’s long slender fingers moved with absolute perfection of each stroke of his weird brush. The runes looked more like flower paintings than the standard “script” looking runes that he’d seen thus far.

“I hope you don’t mind me blathering on. It helps me focus. Besides, since you clearly aren’t an enclave brat you probably will find what I’m saying helpful.” Pilus continued.

“You might be surprised to know that we are turning you into a minor deity. That is the actual purpose of this ritual. Gods, Demons, and so forth are just beings of pure ether. A god of fire and poetry is just an elemental and essence ether being of tremendous power. Every living creature has an attunement to an ether, but most don’t have the capacity for channeling large amounts of it. That is the fundamental difference between an Archon, and everyone else. By flooding you with your attunement we will partially transform you into a being of ether-- the same basic process that occurs when a god has a demigod offspring with a mortal.

The God’s weren’t too happy when they discovered we were doing this a few millennia ago. They tried to destroy the empire. Almost succeeded. Eventually we were able to get the numbers, then fight them off. We still tumble with them from time to time. It’s a whole thing. But I digress.

Theologically speaking, you will be just a very minor god of a specific type of void. Void is one of the more abstract types of ether. Fascinating stuff. An essence ether user of say, body for instance usually has power over the things that make up a body. Bodies are simple to define, understand. Flesh, bone, blood, and so forth. The disciplines will be obvious, concrete.

But what is void? Scholarly types have been arguing about its nature for centuries. We humans can barely understand it, much like its brethren space and time.” Pilus said.

Gavrus perked up at this. He’d been wondering about this since Lady Amatia had first told him he was a “void” user. No one had been friendly or informative enough to explain what the hell that was.

Pilus continued, “And no, if you are thinking about darkness or shadow, that is something else entirely. In fact, shadow is an elemental essence. Albeit an uncommon one.

You know, I’ve had courses dealing with the topic of void and still don’t really understand it. The best description I’ve been able to wrap my head around is a metaphor. Imagine if you will, that you sit down at a fortune teller who reads your cards. The cards are the story of your life, or maybe future. Everything within the flipped over cards is reality as you know it. Void, though, is all the cards that remain un-flipped. It isn’t “nothing” or “absence” so that makes its name a bit of a misnomer. Void is the rest of the deck. It is the deck before a single card is flipped and after every card has been turned over. And not just for you either, for every being that has its fortune read.

Now if you are thoroughly confused about what this means, then good, I’ve done my job. If you survive, we will be able to read your sigil, or expression of void if you will, in the language or runes. Runes are far more specific, thankfully. For example, a hell Archon might have a sigil for Wrath. Wrath is a greater sin, an expression of hell ether. So, you see, in that way your sigil will tell us more about the nature of your ‘divinity’.

Unfortunately, void is incredibly rare. Also, this ritual has a high mortality rate for all the eldritch loci types. It is so very exciting. I’m quite honored. And, I’m done.” Pilus finished painting the seventh and last rune on Gavrus’s chest.

“I will now begin siphoning void into your root chakra. Be calm, for there is nothing that you can do.” Pilus said somberly.

All the carvings on the floor pulsed, brimming with hair raising power. However, unlike before when Gavrus had observed ether, it was completely invisible. There was no color, and no light, just the feeling of power.

A sensation of tingling began at the base of his spine, reminding him of the first time he saw ether at the temple. Steadily, the sensation began to grow, wiggling around in his spine in an almost exploratory feeling.

Gavrus wasn’t sure how long that weirdness went on for, but it was long enough that he was just beginning to doubt the severity of the ritual. A sharp pain changed his mind, and it felt like something oily ripped into his… Mind? Soul? Gavrus grunted at the pain, but he still felt in control.

Slowly, the oily thing expanded, first from his spine to just below his navel, bringing with it a harsh barbed pain in his groin. It felt like it was making a meat grinder out of him as it traveled.

“Guhhh!” Gavrus moaned. Then he burst out laughing at himself for making the sound. Maybe this is what Dowde felt, ya fat fuck! Gavrus thought.

From his groin, the sliding pain pushed into his navel proper. Everything below his waist began feeling like it was being stabbed and sliced.

Pilus said, “We are nearly halfway done, young sir. The heart chakra will be the most unpleasant.”

Gavrus barely understood his words. The pain somehow expanded in width, pushing up from his navel towards his heart. “Yahhhhhh!” Gavrus yelled, nearly blacking out. He’d felt like he was a rabbit being cleaned for sale by a butcher.

For a serious moment, he knew he was going to die. Li, I’m so sorry! I never should have let you leave that morning. I was too hungover from the night before. I never should have drunk so much, you even told me. I never should have let you leave my sight. We never should have stayed in the city; you always wanted to leave. I, Never…. Never, never, never NEVER NEVER

Gavrus saw the color being leached from his skin, starting at his heart and moving through the rest of his body like a ripple. In its wake, the changed skin was a dead dim grey color, his veins below an unhealthy charcoal. He felt nothing but revulsion and horror as the sight of his body joined to the already blaring orchestra of pain like a new instrument.

No! It does not matter, she needs me! Gavrus thought. He screamed with everything he had. “I. MUST. LIVE!”

Another voice joined his as the roving pain made its way from his heart to his throat, echoing with same desperation.

Suddenly, he wasn’t. He was a god that was denied creation. Time after time, he tried to find a way, but it was never his time. Existence moved on without him, while he watched, waited, wanted nothing more than to join it. A light, a soul, a chance that understood extended outward to him. The light understood the need to survive, to be.

A being a pure void, entered the essence of Gavrus. Something that had never existed before in reality, had never been born, would never die, and never could be without him. A Neverwas.

The alien creature extended along Gavrus’s root chakra, and pain filled etheric system like an icy balm. Where it touched, black reptilian scale like those of an alligator, yet shiny like chitin sprouted over his dead grey skin. Soon, his entire body was coated in the form fitting hide of the symbiote. His pain, lessened.

Then, the void ether reached the final chakra, his crown. Awareness exploded into his mind, as his eyes were wracked and turned a colorless white. He understood for a tiny second, just what the void was. It was everything that wasn't. It was possibility or everything that could and couldn’t be. it was the failures of creation, and it was regret, but by whom he could not say.

Gavrus had survived the transformation. His voice, once that of a teen, now sounded chilling, amplified by the timbre of the Neverwas. “Release me,” he commanded Pilus.

Pilus complied but stood looking over him in abject shock. “Your sigil! I have never seen such an expression. I will need to translate it with the codex. After two decades, my work still has ways of surprising me,” he finished and began flipping through one of the translucent books that only a Runist seemed to be able to command.

Standing up, his body responded better than it ever had before. Gavrus knew that he was somehow stronger. That in of itself wasn’t what was most surprising. He’d somehow grown from a stunted 5’1”, to an imposing 6’7”!

A mirror across the room caught his attention, and he walked over to examine himself. Gavrus hadn’t noticed it when he first entered the room, but its presence was essential for anyone that had just gone through what he had.

His once curly blonde hair had turned straight and a black so deep it seemed to absorb everything. It was a perfect contradiction to his dead grey skin that no longer seemed to want color. Exactly the kind of paradox he expected of the void. His eyes were likewise colorless yet did not detract from the alien beauty of his face. Gavrus still had the features he’d always had, but they were now perfect and sharp. No scars, no breaks in his nose. Teeth flawless and face symmetrical.

The Neverwas, sensing he wanted to examine his body, retracted its own skin to reveal the rest of Gavrus’s naked form. It occurred to Gavrus that the grey may not be completely bad. It made him look like a living statue.

His thoughts were interrupted by Pilus, whom he had forgotten about entirely, “Ah ha! Finished translating the sigil. It says here that your expression is… Never. Hail to the god of Never!”