Year 720 — Nine Years After the Summoning
Iapetus
The first time he used the spell, it was on a community of crossbreed dragons who had rejected the Titan offer of integration. They had chosen, instead, to remain independent. They had chosen, in other words, to position themselves outside the Titan framework.
The spell was clean in its application. There was no violence, no obvious aggression. What happened was that the community simply ceased to have the capacity for resistance. The Quintessence that they carried — the life force that made them what they were — was extracted gradually, so gradually that they did not notice it happening until it was too late.
By the time Iapetus was done, the community was gone. Not dead, exactly. But the beings that remained were hollow. They had the physical form of dragons but they lacked the Quintessence that made them capable of shifting, of breathing fire or ice or lightning, of existing as the beings they had understood themselves to be.
The devastation was absolute.
"This is mercy," Asmodeus said, in the conversation that happened after. "You did not kill them. You transformed them. You separated the power from the being that housed it. The beings that remain can live ordinary lives. They can understand themselves as mortal, as finite, as something other than the immortal exception that they believed they were."
"They are destroyed," Iapetus said flatly.
"They are freed from the burden of being more than they can understand," Asmodeus said. "And you are more powerful than you were. The Quintessence you extracted is now part of your structure. You can feel it, I am sure. The specific difference in how you move, how you think, how you perceive the world."
Iapetus could feel it. The power was intoxicating. The specific clarity that came from having more of what made existence meaningful — the life force, the Quintessence, the specific capacity to impact reality directly.
"The other communities like this one," Asmodeus said, "the ones who rejected your offer. They believed they were making a choice. They believed that their rejection would be accepted, that they would be permitted to exist in their independence. You have taught them something different. You have taught them that rejection of your framework has consequences. You have taught them that the only safe choice is acceptance."
"And the others will learn this lesson," Iapetus said.
"Yes," Asmodeus said. "And as they learn it, more Quintessence will be available for extraction. More power will accumulate. And eventually, you will be powerful enough that even Kronos will have to acknowledge your capacity."
"Kronos is the most powerful being in this world," Iapetus said.
"Because he chooses to be," Asmodeus said. "Because he has the power to destroy you and he chooses not to use it. That is not strength. That is restraint. And restraint is weakness disguised as morality."