Salathi stared through the thinning viel between worlds. It hungered to be set loose upon the material realm, the daemonic essence of its sister-neverborn churning in the roiling soup of the warp.
The glittering, musk filled atmosphere grew thick with apprehension and excitement as the ritual on the material planes grew to its conclusion.
Shrieks of ecstacy erupted from the Daemonettes as they crowded around the forming tear into realspace and their patron, the Prince of Pleasure, raised one of her clawed appendages and slowly caressed the edge of the glowing warp portal, causing it to expand and open with each touch.
Salathi, and it's comrades, had to wait their turn to head through the tear as The Masque of Slaanesh had to take center stage and be the first through as Slaanesh's herald.
With a devious smile, the Masque transformed itself into a mist of lilac energy and leapt through into the body of the woman conducting the musical ensemble who had unwittingly summoned the attention of the warp.
The conductor spasmed as The Masque entered her body, flailing her arms high. A dreamy smile appeared on the woman's face and her nose started to bleed, with one word of "yes" whispered from her bleeding lips and her soul was damned forever.
Ten more instrumentalists jerked and nodded dreamily, however the audience's eyes were affixed upon the composer who had began to levitate above the floor.
Her skin grew pale and grey, but flawless. Her features changed, eyes blackened and opened wide, her nose receded and her lips became full and moist, hiding a mouth full of razor sharp fangs.
Her red dress transformed into a billowing gown of darkest black and a golden corset wound it's way around her torso. Her hair darkened to black and coifed itself high above her head, and a ruffle forced it's way through her skin to encircle her neck.
The worst was yet to come as a second pair of arms forced their way out of her back with a sickening series of pops and cracks as they grew. Each was tipped not with a hand, but a great chitinous claw nearly two feet long. The fingers on her original hands extended into dextrous claws themselves, and a pair of curved horned forced their way out of her head.
This same process had also been happening in the background with greater or lesser horrifying results, as the other possessed members of the orchestra were similarly transformed.
With a crack like thunder, the newly transformed Masque of Slaanesh landed, clawed feet splintering the wood of the stage, and her black eyes snapped open taking in the shocked faces staring at her.
Bunching muscles in backward jointed legs, she sprang into the audience and began an orgy of violence in praise of the Lord of Excess...
*****
I previously mentioned that I'd picked up some Slaaneshi daemons as a way of expanding my Chaos forces.
One good thing is that the Daemons of GWs universes can pull triple duty in both AoS, 30k and 40k.
Although these have 40k in mind for the Chaos forces I am building up.
So the unit as a whole:
And the unit champion:
I originally started off following a tutorial online in order to replicate the traditional pastel colours you often see Slaaneshi troops depicted in, but it didn't quite work the they looked horrid overall.
So a quick dip in the Diall/IPA Paint Stripper mix and a thorough clean before being reprimed led to a coat of Space Wolves Grey contrast being used for their skin, which I felt worked perfectly for the look I was after.
Afterwards it was a simple matter of blocking in the black and gold to tie them to the Black Legion gear I'd already painted up, however I used Fleshshade on the gold instead of Earthshade to give a more opulent/regal look to the metal, as opposed to the weathered look to the the mortal troops.
The command staff:
Every Daemonette in the unit has Black hair (to keep the colour palette tight) apart from the unit leader who has the flowing white hair to make her stand out.
I chose to use both banners from the box, because why not, more banner is always a good look, and suitably for Slaanesh, the chaos instrument with the log tongue flicking out is quite unnerving.
The banners:
Close ups of the two banners showcase a couple of the deviances from the main colour palette, in the skull with its bright bone sitting high, and the rich purple of the fabric banner.
Purple is Slaanesh's traditional colour (just look at the Emperor's Children) and I wanted to include it in the models somewhere.
A Genestealer Purple base washed with Druchii Violet provided a suitable base, the symbol is Ushabti Bone washed with Seraphim Sepia.
The six Daemonettes of the unit as just painted as before, quite a quick project and one which I was aiming to have completed during my days off work this past week. All told the unit took maybe two hours start to finish, including drying time, which isn't bad I think.
Contrast paints really helped a lot here with a lack of having to highlight the majority of the miniatures.
I'll work on the Hellstriders and The Masque next, but will be on the lookout for a second unit of Daemonettes to fulfill a formation for the modified Apocalypse 2019 rules I'll be using these for.
Until next time, have nice day...
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