#nalyx

[lootthekey]

Mardu Planeswalker OC: Nalyx, the Dross Devourer

Origin

Art by David Rapoza

When Jin-Gitaxias, Phyrexian praetor of the Progress Engine, returned from Kamigawa with the Reality Chip, all of New Phyrexia became frantic with the potential of such a discovery. Since the previous Father of Machines, Yawgmoth, had perished, the Blind Eternities had changed. The previous Phyrexian invasion engines no longer could pierce the veil between planes. However, with the Reality Chip producing the first Phyrexian Planeswalker in Tamiyo, the horizons for the Phyrexian war machine had greatly expanded. Particularly, the Progress Engine researchers began thinking of ways to most efficiently make use of this new technology. An underling of Malcator, named Sik-Rac, theorized a machine called The Siren Engine, capable of attracting those with sparks from across the Multiverse by combining the technology of The Reality Chip and that of Memnarch’s Soul Traps.

Art by Raymond Swanland

Meanwhile on a long desecrated plane known as Gorigmal, the elder vampire planeswalker known as Naligmal slumbered within his crypt. Older than the Thran, Elder Dragon War, and first Phyrexian Invasion combined, Naligmal knew power. His will and ambition was so unbending that nothing had ever stopped him from conquering planes for a long time… that was, until he faced his greatest opponent yet: boredom. He had sired generations upon generations of broods, and the number of worlds that saw him as an invincible god were beyond count. However, he realized that the joy of it all had been lost to him. And so, he went into a deep slumber, hoping the future he awakened to would provide him with a challenge.

Art by Dimitar Marinski

Suddenly, in his slumber, Naligmal heard a strange melody, beckoning him to awaken. Bursting from his tomb, he found the world had indeed changed since he fell into a deep sleep. The Mending had sapped him of much of his power, but the power that coursed through his veins was still terrifying to behold. After laying waste to nearby civilizations on Gorigmal to sate his hunger, he turned his attention to the melody that sang to him so sweetly. It called to him from all around, and Naligmal soon realized it was not coming from anywhere on Gorigmal. In a burst of crimson light, Naligmal planeswalked to the melody…

Art by Anthony Francisco

…and straight into Sik-Rac’s Siren Engine. The room around Naligmal was incredibly dark, and a chilling silence filled the air. After a brief moment, a creature speaking a language he did not understand yelled out to him, and then the room began to fill with enormous amounts of black ichor. Naligmal attempted to move, but found a sudden weakness filled his body as if something was entrapping him. The Mending had weakened him more than he realized, and although he knew he could escape this enchantment, he realized it would not be quickly enough to evade the black ichor. Cursing at the foul creature, Naligmal sank into a pool of black ichor. The melody stopped, and was replaced with a metallic voice. It told him to join Phyrexia. It told him to bow to the will of the machine. It told him to embrace his new gifts. Naligmal, however, was not one to be so easily corrupted.

Sik-Rac stood beside Jin-Gitaxias, looking to the pool of black ichor as the Reality Chip’s tendrils pulsed magical energy into the Siren Engine. Malcator slowly stopped channeling his paralysis spell, and the room was filled with a chilling silence again. The three Phyrexians waited patiently to see the results of the first trial run of the Siren Engine. A rumbling began to build within the pool, and Jin-Gitiaxias threw up a protective shell around himself and his fellow researchers. A new Phyrexian Planeswalker exploded out from the pool of black ichor, hissing at the world around him as he landed just beside the protective shell. Pleased with the process, Sik-Rac approached his latest creation to welcome it into the Phyrexian fold.

The vampire snatched Sik-Rac into its massive claws and tore the Phyrexian in two before devouring the Glistening Oil dripping from its open body. Jin-Gitaxias quickly teleported the Reality Chip into his clutches as the vampire lunged at the Siren Engine’s core and eviscerated it in one clean slice. Turning back to Jin-Gitaxias as he hung from the ceiling where the core previously was, the elder vampire cried out…

“I have never met a more powerful adversary than the will of the oil! You think you can enslave me? You believe yourselves my new masters? You sicken me! Together, we are one! Naligmal is no more! The oil has birthed me anew, and together none can stop us! We are Nalyx, and together our will is unbroken!”

Jin-Gitaxias watched as a crimson glow appeared within the oil seeping from Nalyx’s mouth. It would seem rather than being enthralled as expected by the oil, Naligmal and the oil had clashed within his mind and come to a standstill. And rather than either back down, they had come to an agreement. Naligmal would not bow, but he would accept the oil’s powerful gifts. And so, Nalyx was born within the now destroyed Siren Engine. The oil mutated when combined with the powerful elder vampire’s essence, and was now something new. Jin-Gitaxias sent out a telekinetic burst of energy, sending Nalyx across the room, before teleporting himself and Malcator away. Nalyx viewed their magical trail and planeswalked to follow them across New Phyrexia.

Art by Marc Simonetti

Appearing on a bridge in front of several Phyrexians, Nalyx looked around himself and plotted his next actions. He found Jin-Gitaxias, now standing beside an extremely tall Phyrexian with a massive headpiece. He charged towards Jin-Gitaxias before he found himself stopped in his tracks by a sharp glare of White magic. Elesh Norn spoke…

“Nalyx, as I have been told. We understand your desire. We know your true wishes. You seek to conquer, and we have a proposition for you.”

Readjusting himself, Nalyx considered her words before speaking…

“We shall listen.”

Description

Nalyx is a Phyrexian Elder Vampire planeswalker who’s mind is equally his own and that of the Glistening Oil. When he was compleated, he defied its will with his own equally dominant will. The two primordial forces, rather than destroying each other, agreed to a beneficial alliance. Nalyx would offer receive the enhancements of the oil to regain some of the power he lost during the Mending, and Nalyx would carry the oil across many worlds. After escaping the Progress Engine, Elesh Norn offered Nalyx a deal: assist New Phyrexia and Elesh Norn would provide Nalyx with the resources to truly challenge the entire Multiverse. Nalyx, again, agreed to this alliance.

Nalyx’s elder vampire powers are all but unparalleled among vampires in the Multiverse, and the Glistening Oil only further strengthens these powers. Capable of harvesting the life essence of those around him with a mere gesture, it takes a truly powerful entity to go toe-to-toe with Nalyx. Furthermore, due to his compleation, the drained husks of his victims are reborn as fresh Obliterators in the service of New Phyrexia.

Nalyx looks like a Phyrexian Obliterator himself, albeit with a cape made of the stolen, bloody skin of his victims. His mouth is also filled with long teeth like that of a Viperfish to more effectively devour his victims.

Art by Todd Lockwood

He has currently been tasked with keeping the Dross swamps of New Phyrexia from rebelling in order to ensure Elesh Norn’s leadership position. He doesn’t like taking orders, but he is fine with having an excuse to feed.

Art by Titus Lunter

[edenfalling]

[Fic] “Never the Twain Shall Meet” - Homestuck

Summary: Plastic plates go in the plastic plate stack and china plates go in the china plate stack. This is very important! Jade/Rose. (625 words) Note: This fic was written in response to the prompt: it's been TEN YEARS and you STILL don't know how to properly tidy up the dishes!!!! these plates go here, but these almost identical ones go there, is it that hard??!? what, no, they look nothing alike! from snogfairy's wholesome domestic prompts list. Part of the Leaf and Letter AU. --------------------------------------------- Never the Twain Shall Meet --------------------------------------------- Jade ran her fingers down the stack of dinner plates in the cupboard, sighed, and walked over to the dining room doorway. "Rose, you put the plastic plates in with the china ones again," she called toward the front of the house where Rose lurked in her sunroom office. "Doubtless true. What of it?" Rose called back. "They don't go together! Plastic plates are for everyday use. The china ones are for guests or when we want to be fancy-romantic. It throws off my table-setting rhythm when you mix them together in the same stack." Rose stuck her head out of the sunroom with a confused expression, bleach-white hair disarrayed from where she'd been chewing on it while she typed. "Jade. Darling dearest. The plastic and china plates have exactly the same pattern. You chose them specifically for that. How is one set in any way fancier than the other?"

"Because of the material, obviously!" Jade groped in the air, trying to find words for something she'd known by heart since her grandpa had decided she was old enough to help him with meals and cleaning, and also with making the best impression during child protective service checkups. "Plastic is what you use whenever or with kids because it never breaks, but it picks up weird scuffs and scratches so even ones with nice patterns aren't nice-nice, and you can use them as dog frisbees in a pinch so you definitely can't use a plate for company after that. China is heavier and feels nice in your hands, and you can pre-heat ceramics in the oven so they keep food warmer during dinner parties, and they don't get scuffed but they can break so you keep those plates to make a good impression or turn an ordinary meal more special."

Rose looked even more deeply confused. "...I see," she said after a moment. Jade slumped against the door frame. "You've been completely missing a significant portion of my romantic cues, haven't you." Rose ventured out from the sunroom and crossed the living room toward Jade, neatly stepping over the patch of sunlight Bec and Mutie had claimed for their joint siesta. "Apparently so. In my defense, I grew up with china plates as the only option and had no idea there were nuances to dish choices beyond making sure the patterns match. But this is clearly important to you, so I'll do my best to pay closer attention in the future." Jade made a face. "Ugh, now I feel ridiculous for making an issue of it." "What's wrong with being ridiculous? We're both ridiculous -- that's why I love you," Rose said, and wrapped her arms around Jade. "In fact, I'm now going to work this entire scenario into the Complacency, probably something about poisons imbued into dishes. Calmasis safely chooses the non-poisoned one because of its slightly different density or texture, but the investigators fixate on the identical patterns and thus overlook the murder. Or perhaps this will become yet another subtle insult Senior Librarian Nalyx offers to Zazzerpan, who I'm certain knows all about the etiquette of dish composition." "You are absolutely, one hundred percent, the most ridiculous woman I have ever met in my entire life," Jade said into the crook of Rose's neck. "And you love me for it, even when I put your dishes in the wrong stacks." "Yeah, I do." "Vindication is mine." Rose kissed Jade, light and warm and with the lack of urgency that assumed a thousand more kisses to come as their lives unspooled together. Then she shoved her out of the doorway and towards the living room. "Now go pet your dog while I fix your ridiculous dishes. Dinner can wait another hour." Laughing, Jade went. --------------------------------------------- End of Ficlet --------------------------------------------- Sometimes I just want to write something short and cute, you know? :)

[relto]

honestly rng can go fuck itself. cloud and nalyx had four eggs and ALL hatchlings are facet.

[edenfalling]

[Fic] “Roll for Seduction” - Homestuck

Summary: Jade's attempt to make New Year's cookies derails into an impromptu singalong. (1,175 words)

Note: This fic was written in response to the prompt we wanted to cook but now we are dramatically singing a duet with kitchen utensils in our hands, this is quality PerformanceTM from snogfairy's wholesome domestic prompts list. It's also a Ladies Bingo fill for the square: Sigh No More, Ladies, on the grounds that that's notionally a song, and specifically a song telling women to stop paying attention to men and just have fun. ;) Part of the Leaf and Letter AU.

--------------------------------------------- Roll for Seduction ---------------------------------------------

"Explain to me again the thought process behind this disaster?" Rose said as she ran a dubious eye over the previously clean and bare counters of her kitchen. "And possibly also how you talked me into it?"

Jade smiled sheepishly from the far side of the granite-topped island, and Rose allowed herself a moment to appreciate how unselfconsciously sexy she looked with her hair tied up and back in a sloppy tail and an apron bearing a terrible pun -- sin(gerine)/cos(gerine) = a picture of a small orange -- tied over her old college hoodie and jeans. Then Jade raised one peanut-butter coated finger toward the ceiling and said, "Well! As for the first, I wanted to do something nice for my employees, and who doesn't like cookies? Even Karkat un-grumps a little in the face of baked goods! But holidays are messy and awkward both for larger cultural reasons and often for smaller personal reasons, so I figured it was more logical to make New Year's cookies. Which also conveniently lets me decorate everything with rainbow sprinkles, because fireworks!"

"Hurrah for fireworks," Rose said dryly.

"Exactly!" Jade said, stabbing her finger toward the ceiling. "Then, of course, we run into the slight problem that while I'm an excellent cook, I'm not an experienced baker of anything other than bread. On a related note, I also can't leave What Pumpkin closed indefinitely, so I figured I'd get everything baked in one day. You have a larger kitchen than I do, which allows me to mix up several batches of dough simultaneously, so as to maximize the efficiency of my baking process."

"I believe you're missing a 'theoretically' in that last sentence," Rose said.

Jade looked over the chaos of bowls, utensils, baking trays, and ingredients, and made a face. "Point conceded. But anyway, that's the thought process. As for why you agreed... I got nothing. Either my seduction skills are higher than I thought, or you're just a hopeless sucker."

Rose raised her eyebrows. "Those aren't mutually exclusive options."

Jade paused, then grinned. "Both?"

"Both."

"Both is good! And on that note, since you're already here and not wearing anything froofy, come help me fight your stand mixer. I think it's decided I'm its new nemesis, and I'd really like to get this butter creamed sometime this year."

"So, within the next twelve hours," Rose said. "Well, since we've established that you're extremely seductive and I'm congenitally weak to your batted eyes--"

"--shouldn't that be battered eyes, considering?" Jade interrupted.

"...good pun, terrible connotations, maybe let's not."

"Oh. Ugh. Yeah, that's fair." Jade flicked her fingers as if banishing any unwelcome connotations from her baking process. "Anyway, bring your weak-willed butt into your kitchen and lend me your eldritch touch. I prefer to rule appliances with mutual respect, but I'm willing to use fear when gentler methods fail."

"I'm stealing that line for Senior Librarian Nalyx," Rose said as she walked into the kitchen. She poked at the stand mixer, then detoured to the sink to grab a damp rag. "Also, I think you got peanut butter onto the sensors. Sir Mixalot is a sensitive soul and won't turn on if he can't judge the distance from his beaters to the bowl."

"There are so many potential dirty puns in that statement that I can't decide which to make first," Jade said. "How do you just say things like that with a straight face?"

Rose shot her girlfriend a mock glare. "Excuse you? I haven't had a straight face in my life."

Jade dissolved into giggles. Rose took that as her rightful due, and began wiping down Sir Mixalot. "Oh, baby, look at you. How did you get into such a state? Peanut butter everywhere. Yes, yes, I know it's terrible. Hold still and I'll get you all cleaned up so you can get back to work. I know it's not your fault, you just can't do your best under these circumstances. Don't worry, I'll be handling you from now on, no more of Jade and her sticky fingers."

"That's not what you said last night," Jade put in, waggling her eyebrows.

Rose clapped her hands to Sir Mixalot's sides. "Language! Not in front of the impressionable appliances!"

Jade dissolved back into giggles. "Oh my god," she managed between laughs, "what got into you today? Not that I'm complaining! But if you were anyone else, I'd be wondering if you were--"

She trailed off.

"Drunk?" Rose finished wryly. "High? Well, how should I know what mysteries might have been lurking in the depths of my morning coffee? You were the one who brewed it and then waved it temptingly under my nose while I was attempting to steal another hour of warm, delicious sleep before steeling myself to face the stygian chill of midwinter."

"I feel like this is where we should be narratively compelled to break into 'Baby, It's Cold Outside'," Jade said, "only I don't remember the lyrics."

Rose snickered and then sang, deliberately off-key, "'Memory, all alone in the moonlight--'"

"You stop that," Jade said, pointing a wooden rolling pin sternly across the island.

"Right, right, you're a dog person. And anyway, you're more of a Disney princess than a washed-up starlet. Hmm. Princesses, memory problems..." Rose grinned. "I have it! 'Dancing bears, painted wings, things I almost remember--'"

"Anastasia isn't actually Disney, you know."

"Who cares? 'And a song someone sings, once upon a December. Someone holds me safe and warm'--"

Jade joined in, her voice clear and strong, and Rose pulled up just enough of her high school choral training to drop down into makeshift harmony: "'Horses prance through a silver storm, figures dancing gracefully across my memory--'"

Rose caught Jade's eyes, and without needing to exchange words they mutually decided to jump over the instrumental interlude and go straight for the final verse. Jade raised her rolling pin like a microphone, and Rose felt something -- maybe the music, maybe longing for a better childhood than the ones either of them had had, maybe love... or maybe all three together -- swell in her chest and her throat as she sang.

"'Far away, long ago, 'Glowing dim as an ember, 'Things my heart used to know, 'Things it yearns to remember 'And a song someone sings 'Once upon a December.'"

Rose switched on Sir Mixalot by way of providing applause. It seemed less fraught than either rushing around the island to kiss Jade or letting the moment fade into awkward silence.

Sure enough, Jade snorted as she lowered her rolling pin. "Thank you, thank you, we'll be here all afternoon. Repeat performances unlikely, but the stars can probably be persuaded into other songs given the right incentive."

"Such incentive being?" Rose inquired over Sir Mixalot's steady whirr.

Jade licked peanut butter off her fingers, and winked. "I hear cookies work well."

After a hopefully unnoticeable pause to steady her voice, Rose said, "Then I suppose we'll have to bake some."

"And that," Jade said triumphantly, "is exactly how I got you to agree to this disaster in the first place."

---------------------------------------------

End of Ficlet

---------------------------------------------

I am not entirely sure why puns ended up being the running theme of this ficlet, but whatever. Also, as you can probably tell this was intended as an actual New Year's fic. I didn't get it done in time (alas!) but late is better than never. :)

For the curious, here is a link to Jade's apron, though I think hers is probably light blue.

[edenfalling]

[Fic] “Sweets to the Sweet”

Summary: Rose buys Jade a bonsai azalea, just because. Part of the Leaf and Letter AU. 

Note: This ficlet was written in response to the prompt: i brought you home flowers just for the hell of it, no it doesn't matter that we've been together for three years and i've never done this before, they are pretty (and so are you i love you), from @snogfairy’s wholesome domestic prompts list. (1,000 words exactly) 

--------------------------------------------- Sweets to the Sweet ---------------------------------------------

Embarrassingly, it took Jade nearly five minutes to notice anything different about the kitchen table that evening. She later claimed this was because her glasses had fogged up from the summer rain, and then once they were clean again she'd already been poking through the refrigerator wondering if she should make an impulse grocery run or just stick to her planned dinner menu. 

Whatever the truth of her distraction, eventually the bright spray of color in the corner of her vision snagged enough attention that she turned and stared in perplexity. 

In her experience, bonsai azaleas didn't appear out of thin air. She hadn't brought it home. Bec and Vodka Mutini certainly hadn't either (though the latter had curled around the shallow oval pot and was industriously washing her paws). 

That left Rose. And Rose, despite the taste for high drama she tried to subsume into irony, had never been much for traditional romantic gestures, whereas flowers were about as stereotypically romantic as you could get. Jade had made far too many Valentine and anniversary arrangements (and complained to Rose about Hallmark glurge and impossible customers) for either of them to ever think otherwise. 

Still. Azaleas were so poisonous that people had once used their blooms as understated death threats, which definitely fit Rose's aesthetic. 

Also there was a suspicious lack of girlfriend wandering into the kitchen to demand food and petting. 

Jade picked up the bonsai -- paused long enough for the cat, thus dislodged, to drape herself across Jade's shoulders like an irritable scarf -- and headed toward the sunroom Rose had claimed as her writing lair. Sure enough, Rose was curled up on the love seat, laptop propped on a stack of pillows, industriously pretending to type. 

"Thank you. It's lovely," Jade said, and grinned to herself as Rose's spine and shoulders relaxed. "Did I forget an occasion? I could write you some terrible poetry, or buy a fancy skull-shaped pot for the Eldritch Aloe of Doom, or commission Dave to draw gay wizard tentacle sex for your laptop wallpaper." 

Rose laughed as she closed her laptop. "No occasion. I was researching bonsai for a scene where Zazzerpan surprises Senior Librarian Nalyx in her garden and they exchange oblique threats using pruning tools as an extended metaphor, and I wound up ordering that one because it reminded me of you." 

Jade gave the bonsai in her arms a closer look. On the surface, she couldn't see any resemblance to herself. Bonsai were inherently controlled and sculpted, and she was... well, running a business demanded a certain amount of focus and organization, not to mention she still had an ingrained need to keep important supplies organized and labeled so she could grab them in emergencies, but beyond those necessities she thought of herself more as a wild bramble than a pruned and shaped topiary. 

This bonsai did imitate wild exuberance very convincingly, though, and its brilliant blue and magenta flowers were nearly the color of Jade's favorite galaxy-and-nebula t-shirt. And she had traded the freedom of living entirely on her own in favor of creating a shared home with Rose. So maybe the simile wasn't completely unsubstantiated? Or maybe she was missing another layer. Rose's gifts could be like puzzle-boxes that way, all twisty-tangled and a fascinating challenge to unravel. 

Jade gnawed her lip, considering, until Rose's voice broke low and ever so slightly hesitant into her thoughts: "No mysteries, I promise. For once, I managed not to overcomplicate everything. The flowers are gorgeous and so are you. That's all." 

Oh. Jade's cheeks burned, both from the rush of blood to her skin and the pull as her mouth tried to stretch into a smile broader than her face. 

"I-- Well-- So are you," she managed after some seconds. "Gorgeous, I mean. Now come rescue me from your cat before she increases her personal gravitation field again and knocks us both through the floor into the basement." 

Rose laughed again, and came to unwind Mutie from Jade's neck. "I should steal that as a murder method -- suitably dressed up in arcane erudition, of course. I still have a half-dozen apprentices and masters in need of ironically nasty deaths." 

Jade shook her head. "Nah. Save that for your next Persephone Noir series. That way you can even keep the science jargon -- plus, as much as I like your gay wizard murderfests, my literary heart belongs to Sephie and I'd rather my contributions went toward making her more awesome. In fact, you can consider this blanket permission to nab any random stuff I say and write it in there. Deal?" 

"Deal." Rose scratched Mutie briefly under her chin, then stepped back and lowered the cat to the love seat (where she promptly curled up on Rose's residual heat signature, tucked her nose under her tail, and began purring). "Assuming, of course, that I ever do write more in that world, which is not entirely up to me. There are editors and contracts and proposals to get through before I'm willing to budget much time in that direction." 

Jade freed one hand from the flowerpot and waved it dismissively. "Don't be ridiculous, of course they'll jump on a sequel tetralogy. Especially if you put in all the cool stuff you've been shedding on post-its all over the house. But hey, change of subject: do you know how to take care of a bonsai? Because I freely admit that is one aspect of botanical care where my skills are shaky to nonexistent." 

"Not exactly? I did find a class on bonsai care and aesthetics at the Adult School, though, starting in September. I thought we might learn together." Rose shrugged, looking oddly abashed: perhaps embarrassed by her own sincerity. 

Jade crossed the remaining three steps to pull her girlfriend into her arms and kiss her until uncertainty bled into pleasure and anticipation. 

The bonsai sat on the love seat, temporarily forgotten, flowers quivering gently to the rhythm of the cat's sleepy purr. 

--------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------  ---------------------------------------------

Yes, I know the title is from a funeral speech. Rose is very committed to her aesthetic. :)