Chapter Text
There’s a twisted sense of comfort in the solitude of walking through greying hallways , footsteps heavy against brick , the crackling backdrop of lava and screaming of far away ghasts the only comfort to ease the silence.
He maps the sprawling corridors daily. An old iron sword, half deteriorated under his touch, is his only companion. No sign of life draws breath inside the lone fortress he’s unwillingly claimed as his own —not even the harrowing song of a blaze sings its tune through narrow streets and crumbling pathways.
Techno is the only living creature—though he hesitates to call himself living—that inhabits such a large space. He’d made sure of it weeks ago—or perhaps months ago, though he’s been losing track of time more and more as of late.
He’d taken a fury, now burnt to lingering ashes , f ighting until the last wither skeleton had fallen at his feet dead, until the last blaze wailed its mourning cry, its rods clattering to the floor, the noise painfully loud.
He’d collapsed to a dust-covered ground, blackened hands twitching as he heaved, as sobs — unbidden — wracked his weary form, tears clouding his vision, disintegrating under the heavy heat. A weight too heavy for shoulders so young lay him upon the fortress’ stone, surrounded by the corpses of his enemies, a shivering, shaking mess.
Anger had left him then just as easily as it’d come, for no fighting, no blood shed could erase the sad existence he’d come to know. Only sorrow had space in his ruined heart, longing for a life he could no longer live overtaking him, every shuddering breath a painful reminder.
Techno hadn’t been born a hybrid of any kind. He’d been a man, though admittedly a lonely one —a farmer who’d provided for his sisters and mother with a loving ease—an adventurer who’d travelled roads long forgotten, passing from town to town and returning home with small trinkets to please his family with.
He’d been young and foolish, he thinks often—his ‘heart’ heavy in his chest, ridden with a numbing pain that’s become a constant in his life—young and foolish and arrogant to think he could enter the Nether and come out unscathed.
Techno hadn’t been born a hybrid, yet now the withering of his body is all he knows. Memories slip through his fingers like flowing water, bubbling brooks offering a gentle touch before darting away out of his grasp. His body aches, an ever present wound, half skeletal and glowing bright even under the thickest of clothing, never truly leaving him.
He exists with no purpose—or so it feels—days passing at a snail's pace, lingering in indistinguishable walls day by day, alone.
Or mostly alone.
Techno sighs, thoughts abidden leaving him standing stationary in a deserted cross-road of hallways.
A nether star beats bright where his heart once sat, taking its place unwittingly, illuminating through the fabric of his clothing. It fuels his step, his sleepless nights and tireless days. It’s both a boon, keeping his failing body alive as it withers away, but also a curse.
Because Techno is Wither in all but name, he is borne by fire and magic but most importantly, he’s borne by the souls of the damned.
And the souls do not sleep. They do not quiet. They have no reservations nor reasonings, a symphony of voices trapped in the coarse sands that poison his taste and coat his hands with their remains.
The voices of the damned, his one and only companion.
Perhaps he should be thankful for their murmuring presence, their stilted words and bloodied cries. In a way, they keep him grounded to a reality that's long forgotten him. Keep him from drowning under the monotonous days—under the sands of time that threaten to pull him into oblivion.
They’re also aggravatingly loud and annoyingly nosy.
So yes, he could very well be thankful for them, but instead he’s rather content in hating their wretched existence .
‘Where would you be without us, witherheart?’ They huff—hundreds of voices speaking at once—ired by his inner spoutings. They’re left ignored by their host. A common occurrence.
Lava-lit halls pass by seamlessly, blurring together as Techno starts up once again with his pacing, footsteps echoing against the bricked floor.
In the distance, far off where his arrows cannot hit, a ghast weeps its mournful song, aggravated by something—a piglin pack most likely, or even a magma cube encroaching too close to its billowing tentacles. They’re fickle creatures, enraged at the smallest of mishaps.
He pays the noise no mind, only sparing a brief and somewhat sarcastic word of respect for whatever foolish mindless beast of the nether is to die to its fiery breath, a drowning chorus of amusement overtaking his ever present audience.
For a coalition of the dead, they sure enjoy watching the damnation of others. They’re like children: fickle and gleeful.
Another sigh leaves him—he’s been doing that a lot, over the past few days—his path leading him past what once stood as the fortress’s blaze spawn, now retrofitted into a small enclosed armoury.
Most weapons are made of gold, pilfered off of piglins that wander across the lone bridge into his territory. There’s an old crossbow half leaning against unsteady nether brick, hastily propped into place by inexperienced hands. A singular iron sword rests in the corner, the cloth wrapping the handle soaked in blood.
It’s not much, nothing to scoff at. A passerby would sneer at such a measly sight.
‘Pathetic’ His companions coo, lovingly, knowingly—and he agrees with the sentiment but can’t help the possessive pride in him despite the sparsity. Pathetic it may be, it’s still his and his alone. It counts for something, for him at least.
He doesn’t own much, in a bleak world of red. He treasures anything he can call his own.
Techno has more small rooms like this, small spaces amongst meandering halls where he’s stashed goods, hidden away glittering gems and small trinkets—and even a bar of netherite, for as little as he can use it.
On the north side, facing a lake of lava, he’s managed to flatten out a stairwell leading into the dangerous depths below and raise a nether wart farm. He can’t visit often, blackened hands more a poison than a help to the willowy fungi.
When he does visit though—normally on days where the ‘voices’ are too loud, when his throat is choked with ash and his body shakes with a pain he can’t ignore—he likes to reminisce. He wanders down a lane of memories broken and beaten, fogged by time and an unbreakable curse.
He sits on the soul sodden soil, watches as the fungi sway too and fro in their merry dance. Sometimes the memory’s refuse to come, but when they do, he can almost imagine it’s grass that he sits on, that it’s the sun that warms his skin and not the humid climate of the Nether. He can almost imagine the unwanted ‘voices’ in his head are his sisters, frolicking throughout the brushes…
Those days come few and far between.
They’ve been happening less and less, recently. He’s been losing himself more and more to never changing days, losing track of time in a realm where time is relative.
Today is not a day for rest, not a day to visit the slowly growing garden. He allows himself a moment of respite to think of it fondly, before discarding the thought from his mind, turning away from his mostly empty armoury and heading back into his castle of solitude.
He paces corridors, meanders past an open balcony, glancing over dazzling lakes of death. His body aches with pain—he ignores it. His hair gets tangled in the second-hand pauldrons he’d stolen—he ignores it.
The voices, his companions in death, fall to a sudden and sharp silence, their backdrop of whispering disappearing into the void—Techno stops dead in his tracks. He doesn’t ignore this.
One second. Two.
The rattle of skeletal bones nearly go unnoticed—the bubbling of lava and crying wails of the earlier ghast almost drowning it out—but he hears it nonetheless.
Hears the rugged inhales, the shuffling of grinding and clicking bones across worn brick. An outlier to his simple peace. A mob where it doesn’t belong—intruding on his home.
Techno shifts—weary and tired—attempting to pinpoint the direction but falling flat. He waits, expecting the twang of a moving bow or the shift of arrows to accompany the slow approach of his unknowing foe.
Instead he’s met with a slow and steady dragging . Something heavy, something large, pulled along the ground at a snail's pace.
A sword.
A claymore.
“Doombringer” his audience whisper, their mumbling rising in volume—a daunting rise of violins in an atmosphere dead silent. “World Eater. Soul stealer.”
A pause, as there always is. As there always will be when crossing paths with the skeleton of old.
“Unite us ” The voices demand, their whispers filled with desperation.
“As you wish” He replies back, ignoring the pain in his chest, the fleeting memories of a sword caught too late, of metal plunging into vulnerable flesh like putty. Of death.
As you wish—a promise sworn to the masses, an oath given, fulfilled—the same words spoken time and again.
His star longs to burn brighter, his fuel a damned Wither skeleton that turns around the corner, its fate already decided before it can draw another painful cursed breath.
There is no mercy, not within these halls. Techno’s sword—frail and fractured—strikes fast against brittle bone.
The creature shrieks, riveted to the spot in anger for a mere moment before it swings . The claymore arcs down. He throws himself to the side, missed by a hair's breadth as it smashes to the ground, chips of brick sent flying.
It’s a scramble to climb to his feet, backtracking to gain distance. The claymore swings for him again, dodged by a simple step out of its path.
He’s offered no rest, and expects none. Wither Skeletons don’t abide by the laws of creation, they draw on a strength unseen and their attacks are fast, and deadly. They’re tireless and unrelenting. Inhuman in every way possible.
It just means he has to be faster, has to be smarter . He chips away with fleeting blows, glances at fragile joints and splintered femurs with a single-minded determination.
‘Unite us’ echoes after each attack, sings out as he dances to a tune only he can hear, a melody of blood, battle and death. He exhales hard, ducks below a wide sweep, only one goal in mind, a yearning, aching need dredged up from deep within, from a hive mind not of his own.
The claymore flies wide, lodges into the wall hard and fast. The creature tugs, its chitters of anger turning to a desperate terrified wail. It staggers back, turning from its weapon to face him.
He’s already seized the moment.
The sting of pain from a desperate clawing hand is ignored as he rights his own weapon and swings, hand grabbing at a blackened bony wrist last minute to stop an attempted block.
His sword hits true, bones parting with a soul shuddering shriek, the head flying clean off, bouncing against a nearby wall and clattering to the ground.
The beheaded body sways, swaggers, before falling limp—held up only by Techno’s loosening grasp.
A silence. Techno shuffles—waiting.
Slowly, bit by bit, the body under his palm starts to disintegrate, wisps of ash breaking off, picked up by an unfelt wind and whisked away.
It’s a somewhat solemn sight, watching the desolate creature wither and fade to dust, and yet it’s oddly captivating. He’s careful not to step on any of the remains as he lays it to rest on the worn flooring, instead making his way around, eyes lingering as he moves past.
His head is filled with nothing but excitement at the sight, hunger and satisfaction at a hunt well done, all located from sources not his own.
It’s a process he never grows tired of watching, though he’s unsure if that’s thanks to his companions, or his own sense of satisfaction and sorrow to see one so much like him—one to blame for his being—laid so low.
By the time he reaches the discarded head, the body is already halfway gone.
“Hello you” Techno’s voice is a soft parched murmur. He drops himself onto the floor, lacking in grace and uncaring for the slowly healing sting on his arm or thud of his knees.
Nails dig carefully into bone, grasping and raising till his own gaze meets bottomless pits of black. The skull, the artifact in his hand, is heavy with promises. A thumb caresses a sharp cheekbone, ash flaking away under his skin.
The world holds its breath, sightless eyes look down, heavy and expectant.
Techno’s star flutters, his hand clenches and something old, something raw, builds up inside of him, a beast barely contained, magic that flares and grasps and crushes .
The skull breaks with a sickening crack.
Techno exhales, harsh and heavy, and with it everything rushes back to reality. The sound of bubbling lava, of the nether and its dangerous glory is almost overwhelming in its presence, in the way it rushes through his head, overloading his senses.
The fragments hanging above his palm glisten, fireworks of colour barely visible to the eye blinking away, tantalising in their dance.
Perhaps it would be a strange sight for anyone else, barely a glimpse to be seen aside from pretty colours and a mere magic trip keeping bones afloat, but for Techno—kneeled like a disgraced king alongside his broken kingdom of ruin, palm outstretched, offering to the unseen, he feels everything.
Their presence is a caress on his hands, a longing touch he hasn’t felt in so long, one he’s starved for—and despite there being no body behind their hands as they glance his skin and curl around his cheeks, he can almost imagine it’s a human being sharing his space so casually. If he closes his eyes…
But it’s not. It’s souls, weighted and heavy as they may be, joining him, his prison a body for both himself and all those he carries with him. They are his burden, the remnants of all those who came before him, a promise—’unite us’—that he’ll carry with him until he, too, will wither into dust.
They’re his legacy, or perhaps he is theirs.
His survival isn’t just his own.
His body belongs to more than himself.
He’s not sure when he slipped his eyes shut, opens them slowly, lids heavy and body aching pleasantly. He flexes his fingers, watches the skull twinkle into nothingness, like a fading star in the night sky.
His fingers close, clenching. Claws dig into a soft palm, the bitter sting of pain ignored in favor of the rush of triumph within, the burn of achievement.
‘ Witherheart’ the voices coo, fond and terrible, a monster wrapped in honey. They echo his name over and over. He’d almost call them affectionate, if not for their animalistic glee and preying eyes.
His hand drops to his side, shoulders slumping as he attempts to catch his breath and settle his star, settle the pain in his body and the creaking of his bones, unable to do nothing but listen to their mantra.
‘Witherheart, witherheart, witherhear-’
“What the actual fuck?”
Techno has never jerked so violently, eyes flying wide and body spinning, practically toppling to the floor in his haste.
His body jackhammers with panic, static filling his brain at the sudden voice as he searches and searches and-
His eyes lock on, something keens heavily inside him.
The first thing he registers, past the muffle of his mind, is that the eyes that look back at him, wide and confused, are soul-searchingly blue.