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THE REGENT'S ADDRESS [OPEN TO ALL]
[It comes on fast, once the Regent has your spirit in their hold. Around you, you may see other Aions stumble in the same moment, as if shaken by the same tectonic motion. An inexorable darkness claws at your senses, and you have only a few moments, hard fought, to reposition yourself so that you don't simply drop to the ground when it overtakes you. It has similarities to Communion, to the way another entity's thoughts and words reach out to your mind, but by the same token it's entirely foreign.
This presence is not like another person, it is like a raging, screaming cacophony that drowns out everything else in its path. Whether you be Kenoma or Pleroma, the Regent's presence in this metaphysical realm is staggering. To the Pleroma, though, it also feels caustic, as if the movement of their aura is enough to erode your own, with time.
Gradually, a new world forms. Unlike other Communions, where you are ultimately grounded in reality, here you can been dragged to what seems to be its own distinct psychic realm. A vast, void-filled courtroom, where only the throne at its front has a defined form. Around you, you see shadows of other people, other Aions, that have summoned along with you... but for the moment they seem spectral and unclear, their identities obscured by the realm's aggressive focus on its master.
The Regent sits at their throne, their body swathed in dark fabrics that drift and flutter like smoke. They have no face to be seen, only a faceted silver mask, without any markings or the barest indication of what might be beneath it. Their size is indistinct, maybe a bit taller than you are. They at first sit reclined, but straight up as their 'guests' arrive.]
It's been a long time coming, my subjects.
[At first, they are the only one that can be heard. Though you feel as if you have some physical presence here, a shadowy body of your own, if you attempt to speak no sound emerges.]
To the Pleroma: well done surviving thus far. Granted, I feel as if my Kenoma have made things easy for you. How strange, that most of you were allowed to wander a city within my empire without recourse. Able to summon that wretched creature to your side, even.
I hope you've enjoyed yourself, in the time you've had, because this will be no more. You've spread your infection in Venera, in Godsblood, and it is only necessary that these wounds be cleansed by the touch of the Kenoma. Your presence gives the people ideas... ideas that would disrupt the fragile peace they've come to enjoy, after so many years of suffering. As a kindness, I will only trim the vine, rather than burn the vineyard. What Venerans have taken up your cause, I will see shorn from my empire. And in Godsblood... an example will be made, as of the Sovereign's moon.
My Kenoma will do this for me. Fight them, if you want. But know that I am no longer asking for your fealty. I am demanding it.
[As if opening their court for questions, you will find yourself more able to act. Those that speak or take action will find their physical forms taking shape, standing in the court as people rather than shadows. If you want to question the Regent, now is the time to do so.
OOC: This post is a free for all! We will try to response as the Regent to people who directly engage with them, but you are also allowed to threadjack and interact with each other if you like. Please note that we will not be responding to tag ins done later than the 12th.]
This presence is not like another person, it is like a raging, screaming cacophony that drowns out everything else in its path. Whether you be Kenoma or Pleroma, the Regent's presence in this metaphysical realm is staggering. To the Pleroma, though, it also feels caustic, as if the movement of their aura is enough to erode your own, with time.
Gradually, a new world forms. Unlike other Communions, where you are ultimately grounded in reality, here you can been dragged to what seems to be its own distinct psychic realm. A vast, void-filled courtroom, where only the throne at its front has a defined form. Around you, you see shadows of other people, other Aions, that have summoned along with you... but for the moment they seem spectral and unclear, their identities obscured by the realm's aggressive focus on its master.
The Regent sits at their throne, their body swathed in dark fabrics that drift and flutter like smoke. They have no face to be seen, only a faceted silver mask, without any markings or the barest indication of what might be beneath it. Their size is indistinct, maybe a bit taller than you are. They at first sit reclined, but straight up as their 'guests' arrive.]
It's been a long time coming, my subjects.
[At first, they are the only one that can be heard. Though you feel as if you have some physical presence here, a shadowy body of your own, if you attempt to speak no sound emerges.]
To the Pleroma: well done surviving thus far. Granted, I feel as if my Kenoma have made things easy for you. How strange, that most of you were allowed to wander a city within my empire without recourse. Able to summon that wretched creature to your side, even.
I hope you've enjoyed yourself, in the time you've had, because this will be no more. You've spread your infection in Venera, in Godsblood, and it is only necessary that these wounds be cleansed by the touch of the Kenoma. Your presence gives the people ideas... ideas that would disrupt the fragile peace they've come to enjoy, after so many years of suffering. As a kindness, I will only trim the vine, rather than burn the vineyard. What Venerans have taken up your cause, I will see shorn from my empire. And in Godsblood... an example will be made, as of the Sovereign's moon.
My Kenoma will do this for me. Fight them, if you want. But know that I am no longer asking for your fealty. I am demanding it.
[As if opening their court for questions, you will find yourself more able to act. Those that speak or take action will find their physical forms taking shape, standing in the court as people rather than shadows. If you want to question the Regent, now is the time to do so.
OOC: This post is a free for all! We will try to response as the Regent to people who directly engage with them, but you are also allowed to threadjack and interact with each other if you like. Please note that we will not be responding to tag ins done later than the 12th.]
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This is magic, dark and foreign and something she still hasn't been able to master or even bring herself to accept, even as it happens around her. Some of the few people she was bound to by debt are rendered mute and useless with mere flicks of fingers. The shadowy being claims responsibility for the death of the worlds, her world, and all she can do-
Is stand there, shaking with rage. If she doesn't have rage, then it will be fear, and she can't- She cannot show this thing fear. She had not cared at all who was Pleroma and who was Kenoma until this moment, and now... She cannot show this thing or its servants fear, because in a matter of sentences they have become "enemy" instead.
And a warrior- a warrior cannot let their enemies have anything. Not their fear, not their blood, not their heads. (Or in this place...shards.) If her world is gone, then she has nothing but revenge to stop her knees from trembling. And revenge must have targets.
So Hayame doesn't speak at all.
Instead, she stares. She stares at every single aion in the court that bows to or speaks deferentially to the Regent... and it isn't a look that demands answers, explanations, or apologies.
It's memorization. Every silhouette, every shade of hair, every turn of joint, every eye color, every hint of scar or defining mark.
Everything she'll need to try and hunt them down like dogs in the streets once they leave this realm of magic and shadows and return to one where her strength might actually mean something.]
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She'd already intended to try and kill this man. Except she can't easily do that, can she?, not for any aion, which means she has to settle for killing his body and taking his shard, like she'd sworn to.
How does he walk? How does he sound? How can she pick him out of a crowd at a distance and find him with an arrow?
Hayame stares back, rage roaring behind her eyes. But her throat is too tight to make a sound.]
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His eyes narrow, and, smirking, he gives a little jerk of his chin in acknowledgement. ]
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Beyond the way her body vibrates with want to leap, to trample, to strangle, to rip limb from limb from fucking limb until she has killed every single servant of the so-called Regent...
Or they've killed her.
Whichever came first.
If her world was truly gone... what did she care which one it ended up being?]
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He'd been wondering whether she survived Verena - if she existed at all, at times, or was a product of the Innocence; what injuries he hadn't done himself, in his refusal to submit to The Thing, were mostly her doing, and his pulse races more than a little at the prospect they might clash again without its wretched influence clouding matters. Her naked hatred is, therefore, a delight.
So when she stares at him he stares right back, lip curling in a wry grin that might as well be a personal invitation to come find him on the field]
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He smiles at her, as if inviting her hatred.
And she gives it to him. Her lips do not curl- in fact, nothing at all moves in her body at all, save for how the dock of her tail and her bony knees quiver with desire to move and attack and lash out-
But not here. Not in this magic place where she could be tossed aside as Estinien and Rand were.
There.
In the world where she could show that cocksure giant what she could do now that she had a proper sized bow back in her hand.]
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Does a double take. Why is there a giant centaur lady here.]
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And if their worlds are gone, if they are destroyed by the hand of this so-called Regent... then she will never see another of her kind again. She will never meet anyone else who knows her life, who knows her lands-
So there is a large centaur standing out like a sore thumb here in the courtroom, emanating so much rage and hate that it almost seems to roil off her in waves, like she might almost make herself sick with the force of it.
Pale skin. Hair like gold, feathered like a princess' lap dog. Eyes like moss. Two jo tall. Lean muscles. Eyeglasses.
Another Kenoma she might be able to wring an ounce of vengeance out of if she ever saw him again.]
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There's nothing he can say to her that won't fan those flames. So he simply inclines his head in acceptance, as if to say very well. If she wants to fight him at some point, he'll have little choice but to give her what she wants.]
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They could stop believing that horse shit about remaking the world. They can swear their allegiance to someone else. They can have the self-respect not to serve someone who had destroyed their home. They can at least have the dignity to look disgusted with themselves, enough that she might not shoot on sight once they leave this place.
But he doesn't. He looks at peace with it. He can look her in the eyes.
So fine.
Very well.]
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He holds no personal beef against her but this is a war and they are enemies, and it's easy to tell from the fury that radiates from her that if he shows even a single drop of weakness in front of her, she'll crush him. And he's not about to let that happen.
Even if his thoughts are muddled, tumbled into disarray by the Regent's address and the complicated future it promises, he meets Hayame's stare head on, expression stony and unreadable, even as he stands near the back of the manifested crowd, hands folded across his chest.
See you next time, Hayame. 👋 ]
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I only see animal that needs to be put out of its misery.
Now that she had a proper bow back in her hands, Hayame had been looking forward to feeling less like a crude beast relying on hooves and fist to fight...
But if this is the master he actually serves...
Then let him know the shame of being best by an animal.]
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It perks his curiosity to look, to observe and put a name to a face of everyone he does know regardless of their allegiance and everyone he doesn't. It's very easy to stop on the silent melting pot of the most familiar emotion he knows& mdash;and he knows it all too well because it consumes him.
Childe watches her, clearly intrigued, although a fire doesn't burn in his eyes like her own. His eyes are dark, an endless abyssal pool that hides everything from the surface, and there is no promise that taking a plunge will reward with anything at all underneath. There a lifelessness that suggests a weapon of war and nothing more.
Her rage isn't fear-inducing to him perhaps because it feels so much like home. His downfall would certainly be to take too much comfort in someone that could possibly empathize with him— someone who is just as ensnared as him. She is the enemy, afterall, and that isn't a look that gives off anything but the promise of Death's coming.
Well, how interesting... perhaps the Pleroma can offer something to the table that strkes his fancy yet, despite Lumine's disappearance.
Hm. He supposes for now he'll have to wait and just imagine all the scenarios of what she would be like afterwards if she had the success of killing all her targets. The only thing he knows for certain is that he can discard the hypothetical one where she finally has peace.
Peace doesn't exist for people that are chained and enslaved to their rage like they are. ]
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She has found it. Real targets for her rage.
This Kenoma has the eyes she'd worn once, back when she'd still been ignorant enough to believe that loyalty, service, and strength would earn her purchase as a warlord's horse. But sensing that doesn't bring an ounce of sympathy to her hearts.
Death pale skin. Red hair. Blue eyes. Two jo in height.
There is no peace she will accept if her world is gone. And if she has her way... No one else will have it either.]
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Amos looks back at her, the only emotion in his gaze a brief ripple of confusion that there's someone so massive here.
And then he's over it, regarding Hayame with a cool sort of blankness. Alright. So the Regent pissed her off. So there's at least someone among the Pleroma's ranks who understands what war is.
The only ill will he harbours towards her is of the same stripe he harbours to all Pleroma. Nothing personal. He'll take her shard if he ever gets the chance, same as the rest of them. ]
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Dark hair, on his head and on his face like a barbarian. Blue eyes. Not quite two jo tall. Muscled like a laborer. Flesh spoiled by ink like a criminal.
This Kenoma will be easy to find outside of this false courtroom.
And right now... That will have to be enough.
Once she has memorized his appearance, her eyes aflame simply move to the next new enemy.]
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The Jinba warrior. My, does she seem upset. He offers no glare in return, no challenge, he simply gives her the faintest smile.
If only she could understand that fighting with the Kenoma could get back all she ever lost and more. ]
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She hadn't wanted to accept that her world was destroyed. She still doesn't want to, even though the Regent claimed it in front of her face just now. Torn between those two, all she can do is rage cold and still, keep from attracting the attention of the shadows and use this time to memorize the faces of her enemies.
But she doesn't have to look at that smile long. She knows that face already: the false Matsukaze. The one who had called her the last jinba, and struck fear into her hearts that he might be right.
And if he has to die in service to the Regent... at least then the sight of her looking as weak as she had that day would vanish with him.]
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Well, he's never been one to shy away from such things. Emet-Selch makes his way across the 'room' (though it could only debatably be called as such) so he may greet her. He stops only close enough to make reasonable conversation. ]
Our Last Jinba graces us with her presence.
[ It's very intentional phrasing. ]
With a gaze of murderous intent, it seems.
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If she weren't the last jinba.
Just hearing the name makes her eye twitch, her fists clench... but she doesn't move. She doesn't even turn to look at him. She doesn't know how much time she has in this impossible spirit space, so before it blinks out of existence she must memorize all of the faces of the Kenoma that she can before that happens.]
What does it matter to you?
[Beyond, of course... the face that the Regent's words had turned every single one of their servants into nothing more than targets for her rage.]
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After of which, Emet-Selch turns so that he may follow her gaze out to the crowd. Some fight, others converse. The rumblings of yet another brewing war that would be brought upon him. ]
I have met some number of warriors like yourself as time has marched on. None of which refer to themselves by the name you have given me. I would like to know of your people, so that you alone may not be the sole bearer of those memories.
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Because he had worn Matsukaze's face in her Innocence-ridled vision. And in that moment... he had committed a sin she could not forgive: turning the man, the only man, who had ever told her that her life was precious, that it could have meaning beyond service to her masters... into someone who would speak of the death of their worlds as something to be celebrated, who would give in to despair and sink into darkness instead of stand proud in the struggle for survival and dignity.
If she looks at him... She doesn't think she'll be able to stop herself from trying to wrap her hands around his neck. As long as she is looking at others...]
You expect me to believe you would carry the memories of the jinba into your lord's new world?
[Each word drips with doubt and disdain, her sharp canines clicking together with the force of how she has to grit her teeth.]
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[ Whether it is a yes or a no remains to be seen. He seems to look out on the crowd somberly. Instead of an indignant tone of voice, he uses one that is unusually sincere even among those he calls 'allies'. ]
None of them understand, do they? How difficult it is to be the last of your kind. One can sit and share a meal with another, speak with them, hold a conversation, and still feel completely and utterly alone.
[ His voice turns a little more determined. ]
If only they could understand what your own could understand. Feel what you feel. Know what you know.
I would like to know your memories as someone who shares that same fate. Though I cannot promise it would make the feelings of isolation ebb, I can offer the understanding of someone who now exists on the fringes of this world.
[ He looks at her once more, the smug smile gone from his expression. ]
However, in this "new world", I would hope that you may share your tales with those like you. Other Jinba who roam free as they will, do as they will, and may build new memories to share betwixt one another.
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But her vision is darkening in the corners, she can't focus, all she can hear is this man's voice in her ears, so very sure, so damned confident in his rightness... Hayame has no nails to dig into the skin of her palms, she cuts them to the quick so as not to snag or wear on her bowstrings, but if she did...]
How dare you claim to share my fate?
[When her voice creeps out past the harsh grit of her teeth, it is dark and fell, weighted with every indignity and slight, both real and perceived, that she has suffered since she awoke in this world. Of which... There were many.]
You who walk on two legs like everyone else here.... whose only crime is freakish height, you think you understand me?
[Her tail quivers with anger, her hackles and the vestigial remnants of man that runs between her withers and halfway up her more human-looking spine rising. Ever since she had come to this place she had been reminded every day that she did not belong. No one looked like she did, walked like she did, lived like she did, in a body that needed a glamor just to blend in attempting to shop or travel. No one was stared at in Godsblood like she was, struggled on the vine rope and wood bridges connecting the buildings of Greentruth like she did. Especially not this-]
You, who still look like a man, presume this?
[She means it both ways, both as a male and as someone who looks far more human than she does. Still defiantly not looking in his direction, no matter how she wants to wrap her hands around his neck or since him in a different way... Hayame spits the words out one by one, heavy and full of blame.
Actually, she spits, dismissively and disrespectfully upon the ground, as if to clear her mouth of the taste of his presumption.]
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