A Single Pale Rose [PK]

[Wonderland_Boy 1081]

Spoiler

 

 

A Single Pale Rose

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

I wonder how everything came to this…
Perhaps it was the day I chose to leave the manor… or the moment I came across that basin filled with blood and chose to become a vampire, leaving behind that name, Alcibiades Aurelius Roa. That life… truly feels like it belonged to someone else

And yet, I remember it

I remember wandering through the fields beyond my home… the endless flowers that blanketed Helious. Back when the world felt whole. Back when I was whole

But things change

With every passing year, I grew… and lost. There was a time I dreamed of becoming the greatest doctor in the world. A time when I first learned magic, how surprised I was, even more so when I became an Archmage

I lived a long life… didn’t I?

And yet… something isn’t right

I’ve lived so much. Achieved so much. Countless moments, countless names… and still, something is missing. Something I cannot grasp as my mind drifts through this hollow emptiness, stripped of sensation

What is it that I’ve lost?

…

As I close my eyes, I begin to remember.

The people who made me who I am

My father… Greg. How often we argued. How stubborn I was. If I had only listened, just a little, perhaps everything would have been different.

Aurora… I wanted to be a good brother. I truly did. But all I ever managed to do… was fail you over and over again… to the point where i was too scared to ever even visit your grave

Agatha… oh, Agatha. I promised you everything. I promised I would protect you… that I would always be there. And yet, when you disappeared… I could do nothing. I saw your face everywhere I went, and now… I will never see it again.

Evelyn…

Your golden hair. Your blue eyes, slowly fading to gray with each passing day. I told myself I wanted to save you from this world… but in the end, it wasn’t the disease that took you.

It was me

My choices… that led you to your end.

…

That was everything Alcibiades once was.

And yet… that isn’t all

No. There was more

Vincent Gray… that name still lingers in my mind even as it disappears… Isaac… Aether and of course Rema. You three taught me everything I knew of magic. I still remember the moment I opened my eyes to that world of white clouds… for the first time in so long, I felt free

Free from my past…. from my life

You gave me a second life when I needed it most. A chance to become something better… something new

And for a time… such was my entire world

Until that, too, was taken from me

Agnes… I swore I would protect you from them. From the same demons that had already taken so much from you, from the life you once lived as Aurellia de Senna. You had suffered enough. All I wanted… was to spare you more pain

And yet, in the end…

I failed you too

…

So I ran

I abandoned that life, that name… and became something else

Zaheer.

A witch

Another beginning. Another lie

Out of all the lives I’ve lived… that one was the most chaotic. So many names. So many faces. And none of them truly mine.

…

I wonder…

If Driala, Corann, and Gloria learned of my death… how would they react?

Relief, perhaps. I was never easy to endure. And yet… after all those years, they were the closest thing I had to a family after i left the Roas

Corann… I hated you for so long. You reminded me of him, in voice, in presence. I clung to that hatred, even though you never deserved it.

In the end, all I did… was make your life, and Driala’s worse.

I wanted to apologize.

But perhaps… I never truly knew how

So I did what I always do.

I ran.

Again

…

And then…

I met you

Rose

Do you remember the day I appeared at your doorstep? Disguised as a Won-In… using the name Kim Dok-Seo, after begging my friends to change my appearance. You kept smacking my head for it… over and over

We argued so much. About absolutely everything. About spirits. About beliefs. About who I was

And still…

You chose me

You let me take you to that field of roses… where I knelt, holding that silver ring in trembling hands. You looked so happy… happier than anyone I had ever seen

And for the first time in so long…

I wanted to change

You made me want to rid myself of the curse. To become human again. To live, not as a monster, not as a ghost of a man, but simply… by your side.

And yet…

Even then…

I failed

…

I left them all behind

My students… Astrid, Jaza’a, Ulisses, Tay

My daughters

Jinzo...

You

I left you

And now… here I am

Drifting

Falling

After everything I’ve done… perhaps this is where I was always meant to end

…

It all unraveled… day by day… until that final moment in our home in Wynlonmere

I can still hear your voice

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·

"Alci… you can’t keep doing this. Changing your identity, again and again… it buys you time, but it will never save you"

Your eyes…

Were they gold?

Or blue?

…I can’t remember anymore.

It’s as if i’m slowly forgetting your face

…

"This time, it’s different" I told you "The elixir is ready. After this… it will be over. But you need to take the children and leave. I can’t risk losing anyone else… not again"

That feeling…

That despair…

It felt so familiar

Like something I had carried across every single one of my lives

…

"Then promise me" you said, holding my hands, calloused hands, worn by a lifetime of struggle "Promise me you’ll come back. No matter what happens… don’t leave us"

And there it was.

A single syringe in your grasp

Hope… fragile and trembling

…

"I will" I lied, holding her trembling hands "I promise. No matter how long it takes… even if it takes a thousand years… I will find my way back to you"

…

Were those truly my final words?

Out of everything I could have said…

Was that all?

Was that very moment… the one thing that’ll keep her waiting for someone who’ll never come back

…

No

…

I made a promise.

And I cannot break it

Not after everything i lost… after everyone i lost

Not after Father… Percy… Agata… Evelyn… Aurora…Stella… Agnes…

…

For one hundred and fifty-six years…

I endured

I waited

I lived

…

Was all this time… for nothing?

· · ─ ·✶· ─ · ·
On an OOC note…

There are so many people I want to thank. Alci was the second persona I ever played on this server, and honestly… after all this time, he became the one I loved the most

During one of the lowest points in my life, playing him was what kept me going. Even when I got frustrated with myself, after making mistakes or feeling like I wasn’t doing enough, I still found something meaningful in him. Through Alci, I was able to experience a life I never had in reality… and in a way, that meant everything to me.

Over these past three years, things have changed. I’m in a much better place now. And a huge part of that is because of the people I met along the way, people who supported me, stayed by my side, and helped me grow when I needed it most.

So, truly… thank you for always being here

Thank you all for being there for me when I needed it the most

@Me_llamo...
@Lara Not The Croft One
@Chamoi
@Netphreak
@SethWasTaken
@i.uomini
@yuiilindaos
@tantuni445
@SimonItorp
@Buhru
@Wolfy-D
@Amesti
@Helmet
@Anonymous_Rando
@LiliumDell
@Nestro_Miner
@Kirakuru
@JustMeMorgan
@Animael
@Pegleg_Bob
@Direswift
@Ophi
@Eri
@StingyParrot
@Rulf Bypharrk
@TysCreations

[Kirakuru 152]

A baby was in a room somewhere being kept alive and nurtured by their mother, incoherently babbling as the world moved onward.

[Wolfy-D 468]

Astrid heard the news of her teachers passing some time after probably most other people, though it didn't seem to phase her much at the time. 

Eventually she found herself on the roads    again    everyone she knew is dying around her, every home she has known since childhood was taken by one monster or another, ever day that passes is just one more chance to lose. 

So much anger and sadness building up inside her for so long, but she hides it, from everyone, because there are still people who she needs to be strong for. So instead she wanders, every inch of the continent where she could just stay and never be found, where there would be nothing left that she cares about for the world to rip away.

But she knows that's never going to happen, for thirty years Astrid has done nothing but learn and lose and prepare for more loss.

[MonteGiant 891]

Spoiler

Thereupon, the peaks of the highest mountains of Azuras did that Hyspian spellblade rest, his singular golden eye gleaming through the darkness of the stars. That ever so present moon, a solemn thought unto his shattered self. But he would hear the news, the one he had encountered many times before, the one he had foiled many times before. Is dead. He would chuckle as a cigar lit within his maw, “Looks like we are smoking Roa now mijo, care for a hit?. . .”

[Helmet 1454]

A helmed man waved goodbye to the disguised son of an old friend. Closing his warehouse's doors, he lumbered to grip a near-perfect replica of the guest's head sculpted entirely out of Bogodan's clay. He planted it onto a nearby beastial Homunculus incapable of thought, the raw flesh pulsing with life. He waited, letting the graft gradually solidify into true flesh and bone.

 

Thoughts of calm flowed through his mind encased in metal. Should he help the boy- no, his nephew in spirit, in this final lie- he would be able to start anew. A clean man. A good man. Cleansed of his vampiric taint. Able to show us the deceivers within our own ranks. Something worth all the suffering the Roa had placed himself through, and suffering Galathol had allowed. A letter was written, sent out to the Roa once the replicated head was ripe. He held off from cutting it, waiting for a reply.

 

And he waited.

 

And waited.

 

And waited.

 

Spoiler

It don't always have a good ending, but man I enjoyed interacting with this fella. GG opps.

 

Edited March 27 by Helmet

[latte 2238]

"HEINRIK DOK-SEO!!!!" The Toad, Seiryu Hina screamed from her compound's launch pad into the oceans below. She shook her fist, composure lost for the moment. "I will visit, and I will finish you - IN HELL!" She felt no sympathy for this man's demise, for she had so previously offered her olive branch forward, and what did she get in return? Sudden betrayal, and a list of issues. As she screamed into the abyss, some peasant looked onto her with a mixture of both pity and fear for the geriatric. 

[Buhru 129]

[!] From the reccesses of the mind, a mere passenger, The Unseen stared into the distance ". . ." wordless for many of those passing moments. It was adorned with but the smallest of manic smiles, even while an amalgam of alien voices emanated from its stagnant expression and unparting lips, speaking in unison, "From this game . . chess- The mortals call it, I have learned many principles. Among the first I came to know well is, a piece captured is never quite truly a piece forevermore removed from the game." Thus, at its utterance the incantation began. The partition between realms, if only for a moment, was hewn in twine. A rift briefly unsewn in the space betwixt lapsing folds.

[Amesti 247]

Another new name. Another new face... Driala didn't even know who, among her neighbors, could be her ex, though she'd heard rumors of him being around. Now he was dead, yet she still didn't know. Would she ever? It was unlikely. Who would tell her? Certainly not her family or friends. For all his faults and the trouble he meant, they would know how the news would sting. It was a nasty little habit of hers to cling to the love she once felt for people. Even as she came to be hurt by them, or cautious of them, or even upset at them, a weak semblance of love often persisted, so that should the news ever reach her, it would be likely she would grieve. Even as a weight might be lifted, one less concern done away with, she would be saddened over the lessening pressure upon her shoulders.

[tantuni445 289]

⛧ In blood-soaked, dark halls, the inferi continued their savagery, shouting war cries. Mortal corpses were consumed, and the survivors rose from the pits as new creatures. Warlocks whispered schemes behind closed doors, kings rose, these were the ways of the dark church.

⛧ Aether paid no attention to any of them. Alas, the demon sorcerer stood with his hands clasped behind his back, gazing out from a balcony. He was beginning to forget… how much time had passed? What exactly had his old face looked like? A nod chased away the fleeting fragments of thought. He spread his large black wings, glided out from the high balcony, and looked up at the full moon. Many mortals had offered their souls to him, but some had been his favorites before.

⛧ My my… he turned towards a demon that interrupted his peaceful night. A messenger, obviously. When it relayed the latest developments to its master, there was no change in Aether's fiendish face. Compassion… curiosity, longing—these were faded emotions.. yet, He put the drink glass aside, brought his clawed hand to his chin where his once perpetually stroked beard lay, the sparks igniting behind his fiery orange pupils a clear sign that he was formulating a logic that he shouldn't yet leave his former pupil. Hear me. he roared to the other fiend standing beside him. Bring that thing we need. It's time.. to speed things up. He clapped his hands together and glanced at the full moon again as the messenger fiend walked away on his assigned mission.

⛧ You see, dear Vincent.. the demon hissed. We have no intention of leaving you in that wretched purgatory! so.. I'm sure you'd prefer that... He stroked his beard again... or the emptiness. Wouldn't you?

Edited March 27 by tantuni445

[JustMeMorgan 2065]

Acalmaehr stood looking at the obituary, his hand gripping the paper tight as he stared towards the blue sky above and sighed  a cry out; one of those glassy-eyed emptying of the lungs that trembles throughout it. He'd pull himself from his purchase - seemingly a small cliff face overlooking large swaths of land- and speak to several individuals on projects and ideas.

 

[SimonItorp 124]

The news reached another Archmage of the Mage's Guild, one sat in a dark, luminous cave of sorts where water flowed into a small pond. Nearby, a turtle shuffled between rocks and algae, plunging into the depths of the pond, leaving the elf with the missive in his hand, all alone. "Well, I always did tell you that you were ambitious,"  he speaks, a low scoff leaving him shortly after. Another voice speaks once the missive is folded in on itself, to then be set aflame by the mage's fingertips. "All may not be lost, we should speak to our comrade, he would be able to rectify this." 

[Cheese 8882]

It had been a very long time since Ilaria had seen her son. Her divorce in his earliest years separated them in life, and her death solidified that barrier between mother and child for centuries after. She had waited for her children to be returned to her--Anabel, who remained in the deserted March she inherited from her Father, Edlynne, who was so cruelly murdered in her childhood, Nicolette, whose blindness bore no hindrance to her in life, and the triplets.

 

The ache that filled Ilaria in her later years, knowing she had lost all that could have been. Maybe now, in the reunion of death, she could finally get to know her youngest son that she had spent nearly two hundred years wondering about.

[Zemzy_Oakheart 347]

Somehwere just below the Seven Skies, would a certain woman wearing wooden elf ears & floating about with black wings would notice Alcibade's ascent, her glance surprised to see the man had lasted so long & yet.. happy to see him possibly find peace.