A Titan Has Fallen

[GDPR 014 48]

 

 

Mortal Minds were not meant to elevate.

 

We all die.

 

WE ALL DIE.

 

Those words rang through Avenel's head as he stood upon the precipice of an end. He knew them well; the words uttered upon decades and decades of his life, only intensified by The Primarch's embrace. He had no friends to call his own, it was only him and his shadow here.

 

"A bad time indeed, Wanderer." Errant rang through his head. "What now? You know what you will become."

 

"A monster."

 

"Precisely."

 

"Why?"

 

"Mm... those are secrets I can't tell."

 

"No. Why did I become /this/?"

 

"Perhaps fate chose you - I know you didn't want this. Perhaps because of your life, you became the wonderful specimen you' are now."

 

"It... was an accident."

 

"Accidents don't happen like that! It was THE VOID THAT CHOSE YOU. IT WAS THE ARCANE THAT GAVE YOU NEW FOUND POWER - IT TRANSCENDED /YOU/. Not Greg, not Kalameet, /you/."

 

"Don't say that name..." He growls, pulling off his faceless helmet. He stared down at the steel; it reflected him, his cross look - a woeful glance - breathing sickening thought. If I didn't become apprentice to Kalameet, could I have avoided this?

 

"Perhaps, or not. It IS how you make it."

 

He could no longer stare at his faceless helmet, averting his gaze to a land ever distant. A land where blade and blood were the only language and your life was the only vestige of hope. He heard the flames of courage burn the earth, and the screams of his brothers and enemies alike. He was alone in this field. In his episode, he whirled his head and widened his eyes as manifestations of a forever-lived nightmare encroach on his means of survival, brandishing divine blades and soul grasping metal. His self took a step back and met the call through a flourish of a blade bathed in starlight, its astral fumes breathing courage like a raging god, beckoning its wielder to succumb to the rage; fall prey to the onslaught and become mound-maker to the battle. He stayed his sword, keeping the calm he held in the battlefield, his gaze remained on the harrowing demons, surrounding him in such a lonesome battle. Or so he thought.

 

A brother, clad in black and washed with a golden sun met the fiends with stave and blade, committing to parries and following through with attacks to protect his brother. It was then, Avenel recalled, when he asked himself a question so relevant to now. Why do I still fight? Why am I still here? To suffer on? For Malchediael? For what? The thoughts lingered as the sound of resonating steel and crying foes emit from the battle before him; yet he could not yield his gaze from what grace and courage his brother held, uncaring of Malchediael's curse as he too fought the rage welled within him. He had slain three, keeping the grace and tempo he so held.

 

Movements and motives inspire others, and Avenel was lifted by the zeal of his brother. He was reminded of who he was at that time, a Warrior of Courage in a long forgotten war; and so the thought pushed down on rage and refuscent. The reminder only dawned on him as a blade met his brother, piercing through the chinks in his armor and ultimately bringing a slow end to the blood-gurgling Celestine. 

 

Feast. Feast. A voice rolled into his head, ushering the heat of a furnace in its words.

 

The brother dropped to his knees, and Avenel's eyes widened, lip trembling under his close helm. It was a disease that boiled within him, a twisted machination of the soul that spread and twisted through his body, threatening to part his maw with flesh ripping force. 

 

Kill. KILL.

 

What could cause a man to scream until he could scream no more? Fight without care for death? Wroth; The Refuscent. The harrowed curse of a Praxic Flame spread within him, entangling the once calmed persona and corrupting it akin to a shade's seduction. His lips parted, permeating a Titan's roar as he took his starlit blade with all the strength he could, cleaving through flesh and plate with the crunch of his own bones as blades clanged against his armor and resounded that which made him want to purge more. He yearned for carnage.

 

Leave nothing behind. Welcome to a land without morals.

 

He couldn't hear the pleas of mercy as his crossguard slammed into a helmet and repeated, uncaring as vein bound eyes popped from the opposed's visor, or the gore and guts that left the Heretics. His fate gave into the wickedness, like a time before. The rage played and toyed, urging its puppet forward to give his body to the battle, to ultimately murder himself for the glory of carnage; he was inclined to comply, bouting the seductive whispers as it clawed his spine and ears. Froth dripped from his helmet as he moved towards formations and formations like a feral animal; but he was no longer in that battle, he was fighting another war, a war without a God's interference, and wars after that: Duke's War, Dwarven War, and so on forward. The rage was no more, the refuscent only faint as it became who he is, piling onto the soul and morphing to his incandescent light. He was home in battle.

 

A man's armor becomes his home, molded by war, and the macabre scent cadavers exude were reminders of home. He woke to another home, a broken swamp earlier in time. He donned black robes and gnarled gauntlets, hiding necrotic, fetid flesh beneath the layered cloth and thin metal. He was a weaver of life and death, and the Embermoore was death's land. He stood above it, donning a crown of thorns from the harrowed Dun'Sildur, crossing his arms and watching his taint run along the earth, be it in life draining fog or the other spells of mania and shade the once warlock had at his disposal. He opted to forge soulless constructs, amalgamations of festering rot; Avenel's gaze veered about in the real world, feet forcing him to walk through the soulless machinations he crafted as the memory played its macabre melody. It was a past he had long wish to forget; the art of flesh and horror was long behind him, but it kept coming back, playing its rasping melody as he was afflicted with more of his wrong doings. The lives he took, the people he corrupted, the flesh he twisted - He was prisoner to his mind, born of the brain blasting shade that once roomed with his voidal soul.

 

 

His thoughts attempted to drift, the Primarch attempting to pull himself from such woeish memories, but it acted like quicksand and only puled him further. He saw someone he wished never to see: Kalameet Izalith, the man who started it all. Perhaps without him, the Archon's life would have been different? It was him who whispered sweet-nothings and assured the once aspiring mage all would be alright. All was wrong, twisted and turned on its head as darkness washed over the soul - a seed planted by the fiend himself. It was horrible timing, for it was here the mage found love, and ultimately destroyed it through the grating, yet seductive whispers of a parasite. He could at least thank the divines for that, after all they have done to him: cuck and curse.

 

There was much to thank in his life, but perhaps Avenel looked past that. He was a mage of prestige who would fight the woes of mortals, an elf who would break logic and twist reality as he became something within the pious and ultimately understanding humans. It was Olivier de Savoie who saved him from himself that time, no longer. When there was nothing, Olivier found him; however seeking the help of a enchanter rather than a companion, but through that their Friendship and his loyalty to Savoy crafted itself. It was a shame that Olivier died, drowned by his own paranoia and ultimately took a close friend from the Archon. It is odd how weak mortal minds are, carrion to the goings of the realm and decaying by a slight push; but even the immortal cannot escape mind's plague. He remembered watching Olivier take that swim; now standing in the same position as he cradled an artifact, and unknowingly became what was within him. Transcending is something ever so sick and vile, for it plays and toils with humanity, leaving shadows of what once was. 

 

He donned his faceless helmet now, although his auric form yielded no facial features, he smirked to himself. His enchanted sabatons walked along wet sand, but something was odd- he felt as though parts of him were leaving, evident as the arcane fumes lofted from the gaps of his armor. It was a curse the Titan had to bear, for the Titan's shadow spread its azure life. He kept marching forward; the Primarch simply reminded more and more of the past he so loved and hated. Without it, he wouldn't have been him. The waters submerged his grieves now, playing what little memories he had that echoed a kindness or even a happiness. It was time to vanish, to begone time and beget something new. Finally, as he moved deeper and perhaps came close to his demise, he was reminded of the many friends he had and knew along the way; they would never leave the Archon's mind. A Titan would fall today, submerged in the water as azure fumes lofted from the liquid, leaving only a crowned Horror to sob unfathomable tears.

 

Time is something vile on shadows, for it will peel darkness over them and disperse their forms till  a clock's light deems it fit to bring the shadow back. As he tread a path elsewhere, letters met few. 

 

Should any try to find the Artifact or the Primarch's armor, they would be unable to- as though reality gave into Avenel's wishes. May the Titan live on forever, for his fall-- Avenel's vanish -- helped him, or perhaps will.  

[Angmarzku 1251]

Durge loomed over the mad Archon, idle and shimmering as only the echoing, pitched clanks of the metallic drones marching throughout the complex, underground chamber break the eerie silence. The broad managuard's optics flicker at the disturbing behaviour of it's master, yet remaining silent until he trudged along into the water with him, chittering.

[1 1393]

 "Our virtues and our failing are inseparable, like force and matter. When they separate, man is no more."

 

 

Irhamir's gaze darted about the surroundings of the cavern, the voidal energies booming about his very presence. Redacted held dearly below the surface, its energies lain there - from Avenel.

"Where is he?"

An empty voice would echo from underneath the mask of the arcanic form. The form torn asunder by the Primarch's will, bringing him to such a state of existence.

"Pah, I'm sure he's fine."

A hollow chuckle would form underneath the mask, yet no discernible source left in bay.

 

o7

[KBR 2046]

reservest 

[Stag 3234]

Reserved me too me too

[Elad™ 560]

reserved

[meg 1994]

In the frozen stillness of her time alone, a woman's thoughts drifted back to times before. Voices, a face she had almost forgotten, wanted to forget, but could not. His voice, stern and achingly familiar, 

 

"Want me to leave you alone?"

 

A pause, silent contemplation, before she pleads, "Please don't."

 

"Then here I shall remain."

 

But he did not. As she watched him transcend from flesh to void he became like the mist. She could no longer grab him, his presence drifting further and further from her until he had become like a stranger. A proverbial bitterness took root within her.

 

And yet, for as much as he had taken and left with her, in broken promises and severed bonds, she could find herself only thinking back to those few words from before.

 

I have only ever, and will only ever, love you. 

[Fitermon 668]

Reserved.

 

((**** dude...))

[- Pastry 931]

Muffled wails die off in the snow of the Cloud District of Haelun'or. Within the third of the three towers at the mountain a frail elf spits curses and drips tears down onto the hardwood floor. On hands and knees he caterwauls, with little but time able to silence his dirge as sunrises and sunfalls paint and wash and paint and wash light on and from the glass-sided room. Ikur is sad. 

[HurferDurfer1 2979]

Coltaine reflects upon the many times he and Avenel had clashed, tapping an erratic beat with his thin bone fingers on the weathered stone of his seat, the two never got along, but Coltaine and come to have a grudging respect for the man.

[Lhindir_ 3691]

".. Please! I.. I..!" A magi screams, awakening from a tormented moment he relived all too vividly in sleep, his breathing heavy as he'd prop himself up and then peer out the spires window over the city of Norseth'onn. ".. I repent, I.. I have repented.. Spare me." Lhindir would say, his righter hand then being lifted up to the  middle of his chest, where a spike of gold once rested. 

[Ambduscias 1028]

An amorphous reptilian creature had strewn himself over a throne, yellowed eyes trawling the barren interior; he contemplated the events of days past.

 

"When you pulled me from a life of subsistence and offered me indemnity; when you taught me how to live, and brought me about men I would later call brother and raise arms alongside... I had hoped fate would afford me a chance to offer my final farewells, and tell you of all that I have done and learned."

 

It's hand lit with vibrant flame and came to his brow, offering a final salute into the immaterial expanse that his mentor now lay within.

 

"It is a shame that all men are destined to die one day. I will not forget you, father."

[Guest]

Dralazar eyes the glimmering ring of power on his finger. "It appears the little fish always wrangle on by."

[Reckless Banzai Screamer 15456]

"LARS NOOOOO!" Rakim slams his clenched fist on to his temporary study in a cramped cell deep beneath Death's End.

 

"When I first came to these lands you taught me magic was real.." His voice becomes a mumble as he leans back into his seat. A tired sigh escapes the nearing thirty Qalasheen man. He becomes more aware of his own mortality...

[colovian fur 8360]

 

The Prince of the Westerlands shuffled in his tent, the construction of the new city had started but he felt no joy, pride, or wonder.  One after the other, they all fell down. He lost too many, and for the first time since he was young: Caius wept.

 

"Be it Lars the Magician or Ser Avenel the Enchanted, you were most of all a friend... You gave me a hand when no one else would, thank you for all you've done, Ser Avenel."