Barachas shifted slightly, the pulse of his chains dimming and flaring like the heartbeat of some buried star. His gaze deepened, and when he spoke, it carried the weight of cosmic memory.
Barachas (low and resonant):
"You asked if the Sangui stand alone among the primes. They do not. There are others—some far worse. There is one you should know of, Alatar. Their name is the Malakhim."
Alatar's eyes flickered with quiet intrigue at the word. It was sharp, ancient, almost ritualistic.
Barachas:
"They are not simply a race, they are a tide — a unified, invasive force that does not merely conquer but corrupts. Their home, their Prime World, is called Malectdil, the Shattered Choir. A place where the ground bleeds black ichor, and the skies burn with storms of ash and brass. The very air sings with the cries of the devoured. You do not walk Malectdil — you kneel, or you are unmade."
Barachas' voice became colder, as though reciting a history carved into his bones.
---
The Malakhim
The Hierarchy
Tier 1: The Primarchs – The Progenitors
"They are the root of the Malakhim. There are less than a dozen of them, though even that number has been debated. They do not merely lead—they are the empire. Each one is the living embodiment of a concept: Oblivion, Tyranny, Decay, War, Silence. To look upon a Primarch is to witness your will erode. Their thrones rest at the poles of Malectdil, great engines of domination that thrum with their song. Wherever their attention falls, stars dim."
Tier 2: The Archons – The Vicegerents
"These are the living pillars of the Malakhim Empire. Each Archon rules a sector of the void, commanding legions upon legions of Fiends and Demons. They are the governors of conquered worlds, the lords of blight, the blasphemous high priests who perform the great songs of corruption that bend reality itself. To face one is to face a calamity — a single Archon's passing can turn forests to bone and seas to oil."
Tier 3: The Fiends – The Architects of Torment
"Where the Archons shape grand strategy, the Fiends work with cruel precision. They tempt kings, seduce empires, poison councils. They are the spider at the center of every conquered world's web. It is they who twist a planet's soul until it worships Malectdil willingly. Each is an artist of torment, sculpting corruption into form."
Tier 4: The Demons – The Legion
"The Demons are without number. They are spawned in the Churning Pits of Malectdil, birthed screaming from oceans of molten despair. They are not soldiers so much as natural disasters given teeth and claw. They hunger, and through that hunger they destroy."
---
The World of Malectdil
Barachas' tone grew darker, more reverent, as though speaking of a place that even he did not invoke lightly.
"Malectdil is a Prime World, and it is alive in ways you cannot yet comprehend. Its surface is a network of colossal citadels carved into mountains of bone and iron. The Churning Pits boil with unending creation, birthing new Demons every moment. Rivers of molten brass carve glowing veins across its surface, feeding the colossal war-engines that ring its horizon. The sky is a constant aurora of burning hymns — the Malakhim's 'Song of Dominion' that echoes across the void, calling the faithful and breaking the will of the lost."
"Malectdil's cities are cathedrals of anguish, towering spires of obsidian and screaming steel, where every wall and tower is etched with the names of the conquered. The Malakhim do not merely keep records — they immortalize their victims in architecture, fusing their essence into the foundations of their empire."
---
The Reach of the Malakhim
Barachas' chains tightened, sending a low hum through the chamber.
"They do not stop at their Prime. The Malakhim spread like a shadow across constellations. They do not simply conquer worlds—they rewrite them. Oceans become blackened tar. Forests turn to petrified graveyards. The sky itself takes on the reddish haze of Malectdil. It is said that a world fully conquered by the Malakhim can, in time, be pulled through the void and fused into Malectdil itself, expanding the Prime. Their empire grows not by adding worlds, but by consuming them."
---
Alatar was silent for a long while. The imagery settled into him like cold iron. The Sangui were power, but they were order—an aristocracy of blood, refined and terrible. The Malakhim were something else entirely. They were entropy in formation, corruption given hierarchy.
Alatar (quietly):
"To meet such a race… to face them… would be to test the very nature of strength itself."
Barachas (nodding):
"And yet, if you survive the path before you, one day you may see them. The Starryverse does not spare its children, Alatar. The strong will rule — and the Malakhim intend to make certain they are the last rulers standing."
Barachas's voice carried the deep weight of stone splitting under pressure, calm but edged with the echo of memory.
"Listen well, child," he rumbled, his many-jawed mouth barely moving, the cavernous temple around them vibrating faintly with each syllable. "Once—long ago—I stood before one of their sovereigns. A Primarch. Not in war, but in parley. No blood was drawn, for blood would have been meaningless."
He leaned forward, the blue fire within his chest casting shadows that danced across the temple walls.
"He named himself Seythurion, the Primarch of Tyranny. Yet titles fail to describe such a being. His presence was not flesh, nor shadow, nor flame—he was command incarnate. Imagine a figure clad in armor that was not forged but grown, black as void-ore, its surface alive with trembling sigils of dominion. His face was no face—only a smooth helm, featureless save for a crown of obsidian thorns that pulsed with the rhythm of enslaved stars. Where his eyes should have been, there were hollow recesses that drew thought itself inward, pulling one's will to kneel."
Barachas's chest glowed brighter, the memory stirring his ancient essence.
"When he spoke, it was not sound. His words were edicts etched directly upon the marrow of my being. He called me by my true name—one I had not heard uttered since the dawn—for he knew what I was. He named me Primordial, Lord of the Malakors. Recognition. No flattery, no awe, only the acknowledgment one gives to another sovereign."
His many eyes narrowed, almost contemplative.
"We did not battle. There would have been no point. Seythurion understood the futility, as did I. He was curiosity veiled in dominion, I—stone veiled in silence. For a brief instant, two powers stood side by side, and the worlds bent in fear."
Barachas's claw traced the air, drawing lines that shimmered faintly with memory.
"He told me this: 'One day, Malectdil's chains will stretch across the firmament, and the last free breath of the cosmos will belong to me.' He believed it with a certainty that bent reality around him. Yet still, he did not strike. Perhaps he saw in me an equal… or perhaps only a rival too costly to test."
Barachas leaned back, his tone lowering into something heavy, almost reverent.
"Remember this, Alatar. The Primarchs of the Malakhim do not hunger, rage, or desire as mortals do. They are inevitabilities given form. Seythurion was Tyranny. To stand before him was to know that freedom itself is fragile—an illusion crumbling under the weight of his existence. Even I, Barachas, felt the tug. For a single breath, my will was not my own."
He fell silent, the glow within him dimming slightly.
"Be wary, child. If ever your path crosses a Primarch, you will understand. They do not conquer worlds—they conquer the meaning of resistance itself."