From being an Abandoned who had rarely left the Hollowed Grounds, to embracing the call of adventure, to dying and being reborn first as an Ascended and then as an Ancient, Maea has gone through quite the amount of changes in her life. One thing remains common, though, in her attempts to find out just where she belongs; she’s always had a craving for knowledge which has brought her to so many places and to meet so many people here in Caido. We can’t wait to see what else is in store for her!
Congratulations, Maea!
Credits
Court of the Fallen was created in October of 2018 by Odd, Honey, and Crooked.
Skinning and hosting by the epically talented Kaons, and functionality fanciness by the coding magic of Neowulf. If you ever see either of them around, make sure to show them some love!
07-29-2020, 09:29 PM (This post was last modified: 07-29-2020, 09:30 PM by Samuel.)
Samuel
Sam knew he was a poor roommate at Zeph's house. He cleaned and kept himself quiet, but he'd certainly been a hassle emotionally and had brought some trouble nearby (and potentially had more to bring in the future). With that in mind, he was looking for a gift on the port to take back to his roommate/crush/best friend (?)/host.
Kaiholo was full of a lot of cheap and terrible stalls, none of which held anything he thought Zeph would like; he considered a place selling various bottles of booze, but that seemed in bad taste. Eventually, after an hour of looking, Sam found himself giving up; maybe he'd have to give Zeph something handmade, like the book he'd made for Amalia and Deimos' wedding.
Defeated, he leaned against a shack at the end of the pier, watching the sea as it softly lapped against the wooden posts beneath. He'd head back home again soon, but for the moment it was a good background for thinking in front of, letting his mind take over with his various problems.
08-05-2020, 06:11 AM (This post was last modified: 08-14-2020, 03:45 AM by Osozo.)
Osozo
Though they had returned to the Hollowed Grounds briefly, to pay their respects to queen and sister, to a brother, Osozo had returned to Torchline quickly, almost eagerly, the allure of the mostly unknown land calling to them.
Really, the hardest burden to overcome was the sun, but with the heavy clouds that hovered over the coast, an apparent feature of Flowerbirth, they felt safe enough wandering the streets through the day. The fashion of Torchline had been picked up quickly by the Demi-god, a pair of shorts and a scandalously open shirt cladding their body, bare feet and wide brimmed straw hat completing the look.
They weren't paying too much attention to where they were going, letting their feet find a path while wide, multicoloured eyes took in everything around them, the sights and stalls and smells, however dull the latter might be. It was only one the second or third glance around that they noticed they were loosely following a very familiar ginger man, and Osozo found their feet speeding up, following Sam to the edge of the dock.
They stopped just behind their fellow ascended, a stony, judgmental look on their face, eyes a pale, sickly, green, and their hair bone white. Not a word left them, though Osozo was certain the weight of their stare could be felt. It had to be, else they were just ominously hovering behind someone, waiting to be noticed.
Slowly, like water dripping down his back, Sam became aware of a feeling of being watched, the sensation creeping over him in the time of a few waves beating against the pier. He turned, finding himself more nervous than was probably rational to see who was behind him; thoughts of assassins or possibly Wessex back for another round of chastising came to mind.
When he saw Osozo, it was both a relief and a somewhat unnerving shock; he had not met the Demi God one to one since their birth and Sam knew that of all the people to be mad someone had left the Voice, Osozo had to be one of the most likely. He swallowed anxiously, but they didn't seem to say anything.
Best to start it off pleasantly, then.
Taking a couple of steps forwards, Sam tried to adopt a smile. "Hello Osozo. Did you come to see the ocean? It's lovely, isn't it?"
It takes more time to be noticed than they expect, but they are a patient creature, still and staring and utterly unsure of what it is they're feeling. Betrayal, perhaps, but perhaps not. There is no motion to the Demi-god as their once sibling, as far as they know, turns, hesitates, in a strangely human way. The green of their eyes flickers for a moment, shuddering in a way Osozo can not let out physically.
Silence follows Sam's words, a moment frozen in time, stretching out longer and longer between them. Finally, mercifully, Osozo deigned to pop it, their voice flat, emotionless. "No. I came to seek shelter through Longnight." Their head tilts, a curtain of hair shifting from white to puce as it moves. "Did you come to see the ocean, Samuel?"
Their purpose is not to be threatening, or intimidating. Mother has far more suitable tools than them for that, but in the moment, Osozo wishes they were a touch more frightening, more unsettling. Perhaps it would add more weight to their words. "Why do you seem so afraid, Samuel?"
"Longnight...? It's been a while since then, you haven't gone back home?" While the Voice was indeed accessible through her shrines anywhere in the world, with the Torchline shrine being destroyed Sam would have assumed the Demi-God would not want to remain; perhaps they were more independent than he had imagined. The question they asked seemed innocent enough, so he nodded, saying as casually as he could: "Right now, yes. I think it's beautiful."
Unfortunately it seemed 'casual' was not to be the tone of this conversation. Unsure if honesty or deflection was the best solution, Sam was quiet for a moment, rocking back and forth on his heels and playing with the end of his sleeve. "I,...well..." Looking back up at Osozo, knowing that they were likely ten times as powerful as he had ever been, he supposed honesty was the best policy - hopefully he wouldn't end up with a knife in his stomach this time. "..Because I suppose you might be mad at me for leaving the Voice...though I'm not sure where we stand, now that I'm returned."
"Torchline is not a place I was given knowledge of. Nearly everything here is new to me." The words come out so simply, they could almost be accompanied by a shrug, Osozo thinking the answer obvious, hardly needing an answer, though the question had been asked, so clearly they were wrong. The ocean though, was a different subject altogether, and even the Demi-god couldn't resist the urge to glance out over the horizon, where deep blue waves and a steely grey sky met. "It's much bigger than I expected." They admit softly, eye's changing, just for a moment, to match the chop of the waves.
Osozo's stillness seemed even more apparent, compared to to Sam's nervous fiddling. If the former bookmaker didn't know better, it would almost seem as if the Demi-god was utterly uninterested in this encounter, in Samuel's eventual answer. When the answer finally came, a grin spread over the still face, so suddenly the shift was impossible to see. Eye's and hair both flared red suddenly, Osozo opening their mouth to confirm yes, they were mad, a rumble starting in their chest to burst the words out--
And then suddenly deflating, the continuation unexpected. Confusion spreads over Osozo's face, the wide mouth closing, scarlet hair fading away to a pale orange. "You returned?"
"Oh." Sam could never tell quite how much Osozo knew of the world; sometimes it seemed like they had to know more secrets and workings than he did, other times it was like they were a child. "Yes, it's...overwhelmingly large. I wonder what's on the other side, sometimes, but then it also feels like it goes on forever." Though he was actually looking at Osozo's hair, the way it shifted colours with their thoughts...it was rather amazing.
Though it swiftly turned terrifying as they shifted to an orange hue, Sam seeing the clear anger on their face: while he didn't know how much Osozo had learnt, he was certain they were probably more powerful than he was, and his last fight with one of the Voice's Demi-Gods had not gone well at all. He put his hands up defensively, ready to step back and fall into the ocean if he had to...
...Then, thankfully, Osozo seemed to calm. "Um, yes. Yes, I did - does that...mean you aren't going to hurt me, then...?"
"I wonder if you could walk to the other side." They imagine it briefly, a deep, dark silent world, seeming endless days of walking. They wonder if they would reach the other side before running out of fluid, before succumbing to the pressure. It's not a line of thought that's really useful though, in and out of their head in an instant, as Osozo focuses back on the point of the conversation, the reason they'd stalked the ascended to the end of the dock.
News moved faster than they could keep up with, apparently. Or, perhaps it was too slow to keep up with the Demi-god. Regardless, the fact that Samuel was back in the loving embrace of the Voice did throw something of a wrench in Osozo's emotions. "I hadn't heard you had come back." The vermilion in their hair bleeding away more, to pale, barely-there pink, while eyes flicker between deep green and a pale grey.
"I wasn't going to hurt you. I don't think I have the capability." They lift their hand to examine it, a flicker of static warping their fingers and suggesting the words might not be exactly true. "When did you return?"
"I've thought about that myself. We don't need to breathe, but I know there's a lot of pressure at the bottom of the ocean...The Voice has not made us immune to that." It was really the only thing that had stopped him from venturing out into the sea, the idea of pressure slowly growing heavier on his head until he couldn't turn back anymore, doomed to stay on the deep sands until his fluid ran dry.
The more Osozo's colours changed to mild tones, the more Sam raised up some hope in his heart that he wasn't in risk of getting stabbed again (or something worse: he really had no idea how strong Osozo's powers were). "It wasn't too long ago. A couple of weeks; I don't have any of my old upgrades, but I am Ascended again." Really, he'd never stopped being Ascended, but he didn't have a name for the state of Voice-less life he'd had for a while.
"I found out I would die without the Voice, and...I also came to realise I had...perhaps been too harsh, on some of her actions." He admitted.
"Not yet, at least." Perhaps one day, they'd walk beneath the waves as easily as they did on land, as easily as they traversed anywhere in perfect, tireless bodies. Perhaps it's something they will mention, when they next go to speak with the Voice. Once their initial exploration of the world is complete.
Sam's relief seems to tinge the entire conversation, Osozo's hand coming up to stroke at their mouth while they think, while they absorb this new information. The other ascended's words wash over them, adding on to what they know already. When Sam reveals that he would have died though, the Demi-god's eyes rise to his face again, glowing the same vibrant blue the Voice prefers.
"I am glad you've come to some of your senses. That you've come back to us." The words are bright, sincere. "If you need help regaining your old standing, I will be pleased to help you." The words are followed by a brief pause, Osozo considering something before they lean in. "What was it like to be without?"
Osozo was a mystery to Sam in many ways and he found it hard to know what they were thinking, if they were still mad, if they actually knew something of the future and the possibility of pressure-resistant Ascended. Still finding himself on edge throughout this conversation, Sam was taking slow, deliberate steps away to try and leave.
"My...old standing? Thank you, but I don't know what that means." It wasn't like, as far as Sam knew, he had ever been a particularly important member of the Ascended family. Continuing to take steps away, he knew he couldn't answer the question he was asked honestly: it had been freeing, to be on his own. Terrifying, but brilliant in it's own way, until he had realised just how many downsides it had held.
Osozo expected an answer though, so Sam quickly provided: "Oh, it was awful, obviously. Terrible. I'm so glad to be back, but I should really go now - bye!" Hardly graceful, but hopefully Osozo, with their lack of knowledge of social niceties, wouldn't think too much of it as Sam took his leave.
