Nodding his spider like head Elgorbb replies "Forewarned is forearmed, as the master used to say. Granted, he clearly didn't practice what he preached, but we can learn from his mistakes."
He pauses then, considering all that has been revealed so far. "If we were to attack you now, and kill you, there would be nothing preventing the other experiments from escaping, right?"
The Gryphoenix perks up as its questions get answered, lapping up the knowledge eagerly like a fire finding new fuel... and like a fire, feeding its curiosity only makes it hungrier for more. Its thoughts become more focused as it realizes someone is listening.
So where is your core? What does it look like? Can you do more than mind-talk? What's the surface like? Where do you want to go once you're free? What's being free like? Are you saying we should go in the other rooms first before trying to get free?
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"Not quite, Elgorbb. First, this one would not be truly dead unless our core were destroyed. It would only be necessary to destroy our flesh to open the tower's portal. And second, think of our 'death' like the clenched muscle of a corpse with rigor mortis. Our hold over the portal would stay rigid for around three days before the portal finally opened, so you would have plenty of time to slay the crazed experiments before escaping with us."
The Gryphoenix half-opens its wings in excitement and takes a step towards the center of the room. Its eyes are fixed on the odd pillar-like structure, as if focusing on the source of the voice could somehow get knowledge out of it faster.
Its thoughts leap from subject to subject like flickering flames, eagerly seeking more information about everything.
"Fascinating." he says. "I suggest waiting until we have cleared the other experiments before dealing with your flesh and opening the portal. While we have three days, no need in starting the clock before we need to."
"You said you could describe the remaining experiments and rooms?"
.:We remember so many things...: The air vibrates around the vortex as armor scrapes on stone, slicks through the flesh that trails the floor, and jagged edges clatter together amidst grimacing helms and shredded leather. .:We remember how Adelia cried when we told her we were off to war. We remember the way we felt our bowels release as the blade plunged into our gut. We remember the searing agony as the horse's hoof came down again upon our already broken thigh. We remember the stink of the heathen's brains as we bashed our mailed fists through his head again, and again, and again, our father's sword lost in the muck.:
Without face or facing the tendrils rise up and open like a flower, as if the bloody cast of light within the center of the whirling debris were a great myopic eye peering toward the nerve-like center of the room. .:We remember you. We remember the maker's discussion of our ethereal nature, of our incorporeal essence within the shell of steel. We require no feeding, but we remember being fed. Remember the crash of iron as we were burned entire by the scorching ball of fire, and then the satisfaction of our entirety being again restored to wholeness.:
The aggressive tendrils jag and stretch and point, before the worm-like bulk of the trailing entity collapses back in on itself and hunkers towards the floor in mobile supposition. .:We will see the world beyond the walls. We will seek out other souls to add to our collection. We will understand our place. Show us the other experiments, so we may dismantle them.:
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The Master expired thirty seven minutes, twenty nine seconds ago. He was slain by a conjured being who drained his soul and left his body an empty husk that she has since turned into her slave.
Rabbits, trees, and the sky are... complicated things. Complicated and intriguing.
This one would compared teleportation to moving really far without moving. There are complex arcane algorithms and planar variables to consider, but it is basically just really fast movement that can take someone conceivably anywhere.
You are welcome, one known as Gryphoenix. This one would call ourselves your friend, if you so wish it.
We call ourselves we and us because this one is currently fused to the other components in this room. This one is part of the whole for now, one and many.
This one can speak to you telepathically, mind-talk, because we were created from psionic crystal. That is a crystal, a sort of transparent stone, that houses the same energy that allows beings such as yourself to think and reason. This one is formed entirely of the crystal and has no real concerns like fleshy beings do, freeing up our mind to do more constructive things. We believe that you may have the potential for telepathic speech, given your mind is quite malleable. We may be wrong, but that is our basic synopsis."
Delta's telepathic response is not instantaneous this time, unlike the past several telepathic broadcasts, "There is an... issue with telling you about the rooms. This one is currently cut off from each room and each changes according to the Master's whims from among the hundreds of pocket dimensions that he controls. It is complicated, but the dimensions have been fluctuating erratically and prevent us from transposing without considerable risk to our core.
We could theoretically stabilize them with enough psionic energy, but we would need to house part of our consciousness within one of you to do so. That carries considerable risk and should not be done lightly.
As for telling you of the other experiments, this one would be happy to inform you about them, should you so choose."
.:There is no pain/There is only pain. The sensation we understand, the absence we recognize, the effect we do not know. We are many thoughts with no minds to think them. We are the moment of battle, the tide of war, the scream of the dying on the battlefield, the last memory of home, the fretful sleep before the battle. We are many made one, and none complete. Like our arms we are broken. There is no hope. There is no relief. There is no fear. There is only fear. There is only anguish. There is only bitter tears. We are the horror of war, and we are the battlefield. We do not -feel-. We consume feeling. Our memories cannot be erased/we are our memories. We are dead/not dead. Your words tumble into the void of us and we choose to pick them up, or they would tumble endlessly into nothing. We have no mind/we are many minds.:
Churning in place, the gestalt being scathes the ground beneath it, rotating faster as if excited by thought. Legs sprout from the mass, made of broken blades, to prop it in place, only to once again be absorbed as it rears up like a serpent, petals wide open to reveal that hissing, endless vortex within, deep red light dappling from every break and seam but -pouring- from the central "eye", coloring the nerve strand crimson.
.:We are eternal torment. We are hunger incarnate. We are the drum of war. We are the blood that soaks the earth. We are the foetid mud that chokes the fallen where they lie. We do not care for what we have lost/we ache for what we have lost. It is our fact. It is our being. The recruit shat himself as the blade carved deep and we are the fear he knew in his last instant. The sergeant fell when the bolt took his horse and he was pinned beneath its bulk and we are the lingering horror of effluence, viscera, mud, gathering around him, as the rain fell, drowning him long after the battle's end, unfound by comrades scattered by the horror. The healer cut her hand as she pried the spear's tip from the soldier's thigh, and he died in her arms; we are the last spell she prayed to heaven when the barbarians overran the line. We are the exultant scream of the berserker as he clove through the enemy ranks, his guts speared on pike and spilt across his churning legs, bringing more down before him before he was claimed in furious death.:
.:We are all of these, and all of them dead. Whether dead a thousand years or whether the carrion crows feed on our organs even now, we are more and less than all of this. We will seek others like us, we will add them to our knowledge. We will take, and be, and know, endlessly. For that is what we are. All that makes a thing living, we are it extinguished in war.:
A brief, basso hum, a vibration that ripples through the roiling mass of shattered shields and rusted chain .:Show us the next step. We march to battle ever onward.:
The Gryphoenix's intellect seems to grow more lively as it feasts on the answers given by the mental voice.
Oooo, that's really neat! It'd be really fun to be able to talk telepathically like this with everyone! I do want to be your friend! Teleportation also sounds fun! I would like to carry your core. What's a volcano? Is it somewhere nice and hot? What do you mean about your core melding with flesh? What's a conjured being? What's a soul? Why are you cut off from the rooms right now? Does that mean it would be better for us to free you before we leave?
It takes another couple of excited steps closer to the middle of the room as it 'converses'.
What can you tell us of the risks of housing your consciousness?"
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"The risks of melding our consciousness with another being are many. The effects range from beneficial, such as psionic awakening, to benign, such as personality bleed, to malign, such as insanity. There is also the possibility of total neural death from synaptic burnout, which would be distinctly unpleasant for the host. This one has seen the range of those effects from sample tests the master conducted when attempting to place us in a more appealing form. We will say that the screams were most disconcerting from those affected negatively."
A volcano is a deformation of the earth from techtonic plate movement, filled with molten rock. It is very hot, we imagine.
The master instructed this one to fuse our core with this flesh you see us suspended in, so we believe it is likely that we could fuse with more flesh than just this. We could likely mold with another being so as to have more mobility.
A conjured being is a being called from another plane of existence to serve a being on another plane.
A soul? This one is at a loss to explain it. From what we gather, even the mortal races cannot truly decide on what constitutes a soul. All that we can really say for sure on is that the soul is something vital for a being's body to survive and, if it is ever lost, the being dies immediately. The Master once spoke of souls reforming in other planes as powerful planar beings, something else we find intriguing.
This one is cut off from the other rooms because the realities are bleeding into each other and shifting. While the Master yet lived, he switched rooms in a much different way, with a slow, gradual transfer rather than erratic, abrupt transfers. We are unsure of the full cause of this, but it must be stopped.
As to your question, this one is at a loss. While we would think it would be preferable for us to be released before the rest of you proceed further, your comrades seem to think it prudent to wait. We leave the decisions in the hands of all of you."
The Gryphoenix pauses and cocks its head to one side.
Well I think we should free you now, friend! Maybe tell the others that? I can't talk words they understand. Volcanoes sounds like something I would like! What do you think would happen if you fused with me? I'd like having a friend with me always. Souls sound confusing. Do I have a soul?