"I don't know if Adalet and Harlowe got to telling you about the Valde Bellum, but it's... why we're here. Um—us, I mean; the Nobilis, not you.
"It's the war for all of reality. That means every world on the World Tree. The Excrucians are from outside all that. Or, well... we call it 'outside' since there's the blue flame Wyrding Wall and everything, but I don't know if it makes sense to even talk about it like a place. It's just, you know... N͟o͇̰͔t̟̬̪̗̲̠h҉͚͈i̟̻n͙g͔͎."
For a moment there, his voice doesn't sound entirely his own, instead overlaid with something that might be Hellfire's, or... someone with a far deeper voice than either her or Quentin.
"Ah... sorry, I know it's rather a lot. I imagine this is fairly overwhelming to wrap one's mind around for the first time, right? It's been..." His expression goes distant again; his words back to half-distracted and almost airy. "...such a long time since I was taught about it."
There's a too-long pause, then he comes back to himself and smiles another apologetic smile. "What the Wyrding Wall does is it separates reality from non-existence. Nothingness, that is."
Whatever that strange effect was, it's gone. If you ever even heard it at all...?
"Well, you know, the ones doing the actual doing mostly used to be human, I think. But they find something in the world that they can't accept, and they start calling it all a lie. Something about having that happen sort of... gets the void in them, and just like that, you've got an Excrucian. Sometimes it happens the other way around, and some kind of something takes over a person and just... becomes them. Then there are Mimics, but..."
He makes an uncomfortable face.
"I've never actually met Muramasa, but he must have been either a Strategist or a Warmain, based on what he was up to. Strategist seems more likely, considering Kiri's... everything."
"That's what she says, at least. We haven't been able to confirm it, but it would fit with her having this 'curse of Muramasa' she's mentioned."
Quentin half-smiles. "Apparently that's 'kind of a secret.'"
A pause, and he continues, the smile faded. "Abhorrent Weapons are the armaments of the Excrucian host. They're made to help destroy reality, not preserve it. Kiri's the only one who I've ever heard of getting made into a Noble, but... well. She's Temptation of Angels, so all of us have to wonder if—"
He cuts himself off with a bit of a grimace.
"I'm only telling you all this because you're here, you know—it's your Quest. But it's an uncomfortable subject for us."
"M...aybe? I've always been mostly about the seeking part, personally, if I'm being honest; the bag—" he gives his satchel a lift again, "—handles the preparation. I've... got my own search, after all." He sounds wistful, there, and strangely distant again.
"Leli's over there at the central pool, though, if you'd like to meet her."
Quentin indicates a direction. Along the way, you can see patches of more and more small white flowers.
Indeed, they appear to be snowdrops, sprouting here and there at the bases of the crumbling bridges, and then more and more frequently as you head towards the center of the moonlit clearing, until the ground is almost blanketed in white.
And there, sitting on a toppled stone by the largest of the pools of water, is a woman with pale skin, night-dark hair, and a distant, sorrowful expression. She is looking up at the stars.
Leli's movements are almost languid as she turns, eventually looking down at you from her perch. Something about her looks... wounded, somehow, though you would be hard-pressed to name which part of her is actually hurt.
".....Why are you... here?"
It's that same delicate voice from the memory of shattering.
The fallen angel's brows furrow (though that expression, too, looks almost fragile on her).
"Scars are proof of survival. She is one... who can survive being broken—usually."
Another thing you realize, about Leli: even if you were in a dark and empty time, a hurting time, a ruined and compromised time in your life; even if you understood one day that you had failed, that you had wasted yourself and your opportunities—even then, she would always be with you. Whether or not you wanted her to be.
"But right now... she does not have every fragment. She is not...whole."
"What is broken is never remade exactly as it once was. I am not... what I once was. "But none are less worthy for having been changed, or having been broken. We are all... impure, and beloved."
A pause. "...Yet there is hole in the heart of Kiri, Temptation of Angels, Cut Through All Foes. In that emptiness, there is only... 𝓝ot."
Once again, there is that strange sense of her voice being overlaid with another's.
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Re: CHANCEL LELI
"It's the war for all of reality. That means every world on the World Tree. The Excrucians are from outside all that. Or, well... we call it 'outside' since there's the blue flame Wyrding Wall and everything, but I don't know if it makes sense to even talk about it like a place. It's just, you know... N͟o͇̰͔t̟̬̪̗̲̠h҉͚͈i̟̻n͙g͔͎."
For a moment there, his voice doesn't sound entirely his own, instead overlaid with something that might be Hellfire's, or... someone with a far deeper voice than either her or Quentin.
Re: CHANCEL LELI
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There's a too-long pause, then he comes back to himself and smiles another apologetic smile. "What the Wyrding Wall does is it separates reality from non-existence. Nothingness, that is."
Whatever that strange effect was, it's gone. If you ever even heard it at all...?
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[ hm. that's unsettling. ]
...how does "nothingness" make a sword, though?
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He makes an uncomfortable face.
"I've never actually met Muramasa, but he must have been either a Strategist or a Warmain, based on what he was up to. Strategist seems more likely, considering Kiri's... everything."
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...wait, Muramasa? That Muramasa? The famous one?
......he made her, then.
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Quentin half-smiles. "Apparently that's 'kind of a secret.'"
A pause, and he continues, the smile faded. "Abhorrent Weapons are the armaments of the Excrucian host. They're made to help destroy reality, not preserve it. Kiri's the only one who I've ever heard of getting made into a Noble, but... well. She's Temptation of Angels, so all of us have to wonder if—"
He cuts himself off with a bit of a grimace.
"I'm only telling you all this because you're here, you know—it's your Quest. But it's an uncomfortable subject for us."
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Should I be looking for Muramasa?
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"Please do not go looking for Excrucians, Miss; you might go mad and I don't want to deal with the Locust Court again."
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[ she will put it... lower on her to-do list. he seems like he needs a sternly-worded letter, though. ]
If this is a quest, it makes sense for me to talk to everyone here before moving on, doesn't it?
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"Leli's over there at the central pool, though, if you'd like to meet her."
Quentin indicates a direction. Along the way, you can see patches of more and more small white flowers.
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she tucks some hair a little more out of her face, and looks toward Leli—and then nods to Quentin. ]
Thank you. I think I will do that, in fact.
[ and: onward ]
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And there, sitting on a toppled stone by the largest of the pools of water, is a woman with pale skin, night-dark hair, and a distant, sorrowful expression. She is looking up at the stars.
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[ just gonna shove down all the discomfort about the fact that she's talking to a fallen angel,
like she's already in hell. it can't get worse, technically. ]
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".....Why are you... here?"
It's that same delicate voice from the memory of shattering.
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...that's a very good question. For Hellfire. Kiri, that is.
She seems to be having a bit of a crisis, to be frank.
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"Scars are proof of survival. She is one... who can survive being broken—usually."
Another thing you realize, about Leli: even if you were in a dark and empty time, a hurting time, a ruined and compromised time in your life; even if you understood one day that you had failed, that you had wasted yourself and your opportunities—even then, she would always be with you. Whether or not you wanted her to be.
"But right now... she does not have every fragment. She is not...whole."
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[ that's. uncomfortable, in a way, maybe because...
...well, should a fallen angel feel like what God is supposed to be? ]
...what is she missing, then?
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She looks at you again. "But it cannot exist here."
At the base of the stone, another snowdrop pushes up through the soil.
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The sort of thing that can't be remade quite the same way again, then.
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"But none are less worthy for having been changed, or having been broken. We are all... impure, and beloved."
A pause. "...Yet there is hole in the heart of Kiri, Temptation of Angels, Cut Through All Foes. In that emptiness, there is only... 𝓝ot."
Once again, there is that strange sense of her voice being overlaid with another's.
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Which is to say—as that gentleman over there told me—that which lies outside Creation, which would destroy the world.
...I'd imagine that's hard, for someone who has such wholehearted enthusiasm for everyone and everything she encounters.
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