Dagger

Every single "gift" Galen had bestowed upon the snakemen was, of course, already meticulously tagged with a hidden price. As a Loa worshipped by the sethrak, Sethraliss would, in due time, be footing the bill for her devout followers. All in all, this little negotiation had been a resounding success for all three parties involved – though only one of them, Galen, truly understood the long-term payment plan.

Meanwhile, at Atul'Aman, the earth-shattering symphony of battle was finally winding down.

"Scree!"

A clarion call, sharp and pure, sliced through the smoke-choked air. Thranduil's phoenix, a living inferno named Yan, beat its colossal, flaming wings, churning the very atmosphere into a searing vortex. As the Fire Phoenix soared, a glittering cascade of sparks rained down, each one a tiny star. Its eyes, twin furnaces of constantly spewing flame, were locked with predatory vigilance onto the grotesque, dark evil god writhing on the ground below.

A terrifying, purifying sea of crimson fire consumed everything in its path. The Disassembler Mythrax, a truly unpleasant piece of cosmic horror, was undergoing a rather thorough baptism of purgatorial flames. Its obsidian-like hide was a canvas of charred, smoking scars, and even the pair of ugly, leathery wings that had once propelled it through the void had shriveled and detached, falling away like burnt toast. The flames, however, were far from finished. They surged relentlessly into its body through every orifice – nose, mouth, ears – a mad, internal combustion, igniting everything that could possibly burn!

Its cosmic clock had entered the final, agonizing countdown.

"Yan," Thranduil's voice boomed, resonating with arcane power, "let's go ahead and give it the final blow! And by the way, let's try out our new abilities!"

"Scree!" Yan responded, a joyous burst of avian fire. The Phoenix's entire body shimmered, then dissolved into a stream of incandescent red light, merging, bit by bit, into Thranduil's very being!

This was the dazzling, brand-new trick of the newly ascended Fire Demigod: the ability to seamlessly fuse with any fire elemental life that had signed a binding life contract with him. The result? A power surge that made 1+1 equal something closer to "incinerate the universe."

"Feel the baptism of the sun's fire, you overgrown cockroach!"

The sheer influx of elemental fire warped Thranduil's very form. The flames, now an extension of Yan's essence, slowly coalesced into a magnificent set of living flame armor, clinging to his body like a second skin. A glorious, golden-red inferno billowed behind him, forming a cape that would make any fashion-conscious dragon jealous. Even his hair and eyebrows, once a dignified gold, flared into vibrant, fiery red, making him look rather alarmingly like a particularly enthusiastic, sentient Olympic mascot.

Fusion complete, Thranduil launched himself from the air, a flaming meteor of righteous fury. Amidst the howling winds of his descent, he raised the Quel'dorei Golden Staff in both hands, a blazing spear of light, and plunged it, with all his might, into the evil god's colossal head!

Mythrax, in its dying throes, flailed its claws, attempting to swat Thranduil from the sky like an annoying fly. But it was too late. His chitinous, lobster-like appendages were effortlessly pierced by the Quel'dorei Golden Staff, melting away like an ice cube meeting a red-hot branding iron!

"Roar~" Mythrax's maw gaped wide in a silent, furious scream. No sound escaped its burning throat, yet its terrifying, mental roar reverberated directly in Thranduil's mind, a desperate, telepathic shriek of agony.

As one of the four formidable giants of the Heart of Origin, Thranduil was utterly immune to the seductive, sanity-blasting whispers of the Old Gods. A mere servant of theirs, even a particularly ugly one like Mythrax, was hardly going to give him a headache. Besides, the Disassembler was, at best, a mid-tier Old God minion, certainly no match for the true horrors like Warlord Zon'ozz or Yor'sahj the Unsleeping, N'Zoth's favorite right-hand men.

After skewering the Disassembler's arm, Thranduil moved with impossible speed across its monstrous body, leaving a trail of glowing red lines in his wake.

BOOM!

Those crimson lines exploded into gouts of pure, searing flame, the tips of the inferno gushing more than three feet high! Then, with a sickening crackle, Mythrax's colossal body decomposed into more than a dozen smoking, charred pieces along the very lines Thranduil had drawn!

Foul, corrupt, inky-black ichor spurted out endlessly from its dismembered remains, pooling on the ground like a nightmare oil slick.

"Disgusting stuff," Thranduil muttered, reappearing beside the largest fragment: the Disassembler's still-twitching head. He then produced a rather ominous-looking dagger from his pouch: Xal'atath.

"Same evil weapon," he mused aloud, eyeing the dagger. "What in the Light is Galen planning to experiment with this time?"

Even the massive fragment of Mythrax's head looked like a mere toothpick compared to the hungry maw of the Blade of the Dark Empire. Thranduil, with a grimace of distaste, held Xal'atath and plunged it fiercely into the Dismantler's forehead.

The entire blade of the dagger sank deep, vanishing completely!

"Ah! Yes! That's the feeling!"

Xal'atath's voice, a sickeningly joyful, almost orgasmic groan, echoed directly in Thranduil's mind, causing him to frown in profound irritation. This dagger was absolutely brimming with void power, giving him a rather ominous, profoundly icky feeling.

"More! More!" the dagger shrieked, its voice growing increasingly frantic.

Along with Xal'atath's disturbing groans and demands, the ancient god's servant's head began to shrivel, drying out like a forgotten prune. Finally, with a soft poof, it crumbled into a pathetic pile of black ash!

"High elf, give me a new one." Even after sucking Mythrax's head dry, Xal'atath still felt woefully underfed, its hunger insatiable.

However, Thranduil was not one to obey sentient, bloodthirsty daggers. Instead, he pulled the dagger out, its tip still dripping with void-tainted energy, and prepared to stuff it back into his magic pouch.

"I command you! Impale me on those corpses!" Xal'atath's voice shrieked again, its tone shifting from greedy pleasure to outright, furious command. It was clearly not used to being told "no."

Seeing that Thranduil wasn't even pausing his pouch-opening ritual, Xal'atath burst forth with a wave of raw void power, attempting to seize control of the high elf, just as it had done to countless unfortunate wielders before him.

Unfortunately for the dagger, it slammed into a wall. A very, very hot wall.

Thranduil, thoroughly annoyed, gripped the dagger tightly. A torrent of searing red-gold flame erupted from his hand, engulfing his entire fist and the entirety of the Dark Empire Blade in a blinding inferno.

Xal'atath immediately let out a frantic, high-pitched shriek of pure terror. "Damn it! You bastard! This is pure elemental fire! It burns! It burns!"

"Stop! High elf!"

"Shut up, you evil little paperweight," Thranduil growled, his voice laced with the crackle of flame. "I don't know what use Galen has for you, but I certainly don't need you telling me what to do!"

With that, Thranduil unceremoniously shoved the still-screaming Blade of the Dark Empire into his pouch and, with a decisive snap, cinched the drawstring tight. The muffled, furious shrieks from within were a surprisingly satisfying sound.