1. |
Ashen
07:38
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I am your king, a living god to whom all the world will bow as I sit upon a pale white throne of spines
I have conquered every last remaining civilization, the bounds of my kingdom know no horizon
I despise peace, but now the wars I have waged have all been won
I become restless for heavy lies the crown
I send for my dark sages to scour the ancient texts
There must be something I have overlooked; new knowledge to inspire this weary mind of mine
I must find new victories in the absence of war
Years pass by with no new discoveries made
Losing my patience, I execute each sage
Unsatisfied, I see that the athenaeum is burned to the ground
If I cannot find new knowledge I will conjure it from the flames
Into them I stare intently, but nothing is all I can see, when suddenly a wandering sorcerer comes bearing tribute
Clutched inside his hand in an enchanted mirror; a gift that only I may receive
Divine wisdom comes from reflection, he says to me as he holds it out
I seize it
I gaze deep into the mirror
The blood drains out of my face
Onlookers gasp in horror; my ashen expression embodies my despair
Years pass by as I sit in paralysis
My subjects cannot bear to look upon me
The mirror at last slips from my grasp, falling to the ground where it shatters
Smoking shards of glass lay at my feet
Silence reigns in my abandoned keep
My twisted expression, frozen on my face, is a monument to the knowledge I sought
I found the final truth of all existence: absolute meaninglessness
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2. |
Mythos
04:27
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Strange is the twilight where the twin suns set and the black stars rise
Stranger still: the fading light followed by the dead moon’s illuminated sky
A faded memory of a city where the shadows lengthen: dim Carcosa, dim Carcosa
I search for signs of the yellow king, clothed in tatters of the songs I must sing
The cloudwaves break on the shores now lost
Damned are those with whom my path has crossed
Feast not upon us, oh king, not upon us!
I will tear this pallid mask from my face
Murmur truth to the statuesque faces of the dead magi in a trance from which the ghosts of this mysterious place cannot hide
Blood rituals known to me from across the aeons be my guide
Call your name to reopen the path to the only place I have ever called my home
The satellite solstice commemorates another unshed tear
Wraith, shear the fog with your mighty scythe and reveal unto me the passage forth to the place absent on any earthly map, where memories perish
Now and forever I wish to reside on the plane of convoluted dreams
Die, come and die with me you powerless priest
Complete the circle while the twin suns’ dawn breaks on misty fields, revealing an enlightened path laid before me
I have waited a lifetime to return to my disintegrated paradise
Fractured visions of the final act, they all come flooding to my mind
Tearing my sanity to shreds with their devastating insight
Freed now of reason I can see them: the eldritch great ones in their glory
Their impossible geometry beckons me forever
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3. |
Cytokine Storm
05:01
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I awaken to a world of blinding pain
My eyes beneath wraps struggle to comprehend
I have no memory of what has transpired
My ears hear only the horrifying drone of machines
In agony I try to breathe
I can feel panic growing inside me
I am broken, my vision now reduced to shadows
I have become a tortured freak
An amalgam of grafted skin stitched together; a disgusting pile of human parts
In agony, I am broken, a tortured freak
Let me die
Hateful consciousness brings revelations of cellular war
Microscopic macrophages begin to react
They now engulf foreign bodies
The experiment, as I am now called, appears to be a disaster
All the injections and amputations have been undertaken in vain
Raging infections pulse through septic limbs
Under callous observation I progress toward grade 5: death
Convulsing in pain
Riddled with IV’s
The immune response will bring death
Killer cells converge: the perfect cytokine storm
Invisible destruction
A self-replicating chain reaction grows exponentially, attacking indiscriminately
A feedback loop borne of this clinical crucible consumes itself with tenacious ferocity, delivering every cell into terminal eternity
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4. |
Etymologicide
08:13
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I am not born of this world; I will see to the extermination of this scourge
A language from before time holds within itself an unspeakable curse
The circle of masked sages, hiding among themselves the secret tongue of horror, must never be allowed to utter their twisted chants in the realm of mortals
Oh no, not once more
Black blood flows in the veins beneath my rune-scarred flesh as I look to the horizon
Now begins my quest of evisceration
I vow here and now to be the hand of judgment
I will find and silence them all to the very last
I push distraction out of my mind and mount my dark steed
Wielding blades forged from enchanted steel
Etched upon them the most sacred of spells: a hex to cause ankyloglossia
I ride past frozen mountains, through plains, and over black swamps
I am so far now from home, and I have never been more alone
Beneath ragged breath I whisper their cursed names
My soliloquy, spoken near inaudibly
The haunting visage of the speakers’ gnarled forms animates itself behind the closed lids of my bloodshot eyes
Deep inside my visions I see my reflection: it is a speaker’s face coldly staring me down
Pouring rain awakens me
How many days has it been since I began my journey?
And will I ever succeed?
Fear and doubt now infect me
Did I ride quixotically?
Suddenly the ground gives way and I hear forbidden chants
Fate arrives!
I alone can make the righteous excision
Black leylines guide me into the sacred void
I will bring forth the end of the eternal
I press forth into the lair of my damned prey
Stalagtites formed of blood drip from the ceiling
A cavern lies before me, holding the key to the end of my journey
I come bearing the gift of silence
One by one I smite them as they stand motionless in fear
Jaws torn open, tongues laid out: a most glorious glossectomy
Blood drains from gaping maws
Never again will these perverse syllables be spoken aloud
Their tongues severed, just one is left
It is my own; I tear it out
Blood fills my mouth like a poisoned chalice of wine
I drown silent
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5. |
Jurisprudence
04:07
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You will be judged by unseen authority
You will appear before the court of silence
You will answer for your criminality
You will never know the nature of the charges brought against you
These are the words of the faceless men who now accost me in my own home
Law has no meaning here outside of being a force of pure domination
I am subject to absurd rules by incomprehensible lawmakers, yet I know full well I cannot escape the downward swing of the gavel
Left alone, I attempt to gather my thoughts
Mounting fear quickens my pulse
There must be a way out of this byzantine labyrinth of cruelty ending in ruthless punishment
Venturing out under cover of darkness I seek my counsel
I am told the process is designed to demoralize me into submission
I can only delay, for in secret the fact of my guilt is assumed
The trial date arrives swiftly, I have exhausted my appeals
The courthouse looms large before me as I begin to climb the steps
The faceless judge sits atop his lofty dais exuding contempt
Meeting the eyeless gaze of the magistrate I begin my fulmination
Standing tall I excoriate this farce masquerading as jurisprudence
The court of silence erupts in shock as I unsheath my concealed blade
It is my fate to carry out their sentence
These are the words I have spoken as I prepare to end my own life
I am subject to absurd rules by incomprehensible lawmakers, and knowing full well I cannot escape from the downward swing of the gavel I plunge the knife into my heart
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6. |
Excursus Praestinguo
01:35
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7. |
Abhortion
04:08
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Mankind is no more than the sum of all its parts lacking in any true purpose
I feel disconnected from all those around me yet infected by their presence
Blood, bone, flesh and organs; chemical reactions and electricity animate me
If there is nothing more to what makes me human, what is this presence I feel inside me, growing with each passing day?
I possess neither faith nor spirituality
The human soul is an absurd concept to me, but I cannot deny that I have begun to sense an entity
A mass of tissue comprising my humanity
My discomfort grows as my organs are displaced
I find myself clawing at my eyes until they begin to bleed, as though this horrible presence is just behind them
The seed of pain it planted has blossomed into hellish agony
My mind comes to an epiphany
I prep my body for surgery
Smearing my stomach with alcohol I jab a serrated knife into my midsection
Blood pools around me as I strain against the resistance of my musculature
I plunge my hand into the wound, searching for my antagonist
Mankind is no more than the sum of all its parts lacking in any true purpose
Blood, bone, flesh and organs all torn out frantically; in my effort to remove my gestating soul I will die
Finally, I can feel its viscous exterior
Grasped tightly in my fist, I crush it with all my strength
The gory pile of viscera begins to pulsate as I draw my last breath
Stillborn no longer, mitosis takes over and accelerates its growth rate
Darkening my corpse in shadow: the embodiment of inhumanity
This is my final gift to an insufferable world
A nightmare creature that will engage in self-replication
As it strides forward with my improvised surgical tools, it will now begin its new reign as the harvester of souls.
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8. |
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Never before have I seen a creature so befitting removal from its miserable existence
All human forms disgust me, but this living offense is not something I am prepared to tolerate
It is beyond gut wrenching to think that you and I are considered to be the exact same species
I will pound you into the multiverse, which is itself composed entirely of a quantum superposition of non-denumerable infinitely increasing divergence
I am the fundamental entity known heretofore as the observer
A sentient being possessed of infinite minds hellbent on existential destruction
The elimination of their decoherence has allowed them to coalesce inside me
My neurons begin an irreversible cascading entanglement as all possible variations of myself become aware of each other
My intellect expands exponentially while my beta-wave functions collapse into a singularity
My eyes now penetrate reality; I experience infinity
The theory of many minds held the key to unlock the secret of how to eliminate my enemy
I focus every one of my myriad minds on the source of my revulsion
I can now see that reality is not a single unfolding history
I must be certain that your existence does not survive in another dimension, for I abhor it so
Killing you is not enough to satisfy my bloodlust now magnified a thousandfold by my cerebral cortices amplifying each other across subatomic fields with relentless force
I clench my fists in every conceivable reality
With my victim bound in quantum strings the beating begins
I will rain crushing blows upon you showing no mercy, breaking you into infinitesimal particulates which will forever be entangled with unending death
There are many worlds, but in all of them you are dead
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Ara Milwaukee, Wisconsin
4 piece death metal band from Milwaukee, WI, featuring members of Northless and Concentric.
Lineup:
James Becker-bass
Adam Bujny-vocals
Jerry Hauppa-guitar
Erik Stenglein- drums
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