[Legitimately, everyone from ancient fantasy China is making her so tired.
She can relate to the tension in his shoulders and the way he's not looking at her, though. Everyone has things they'd rather not discuss - she knows that just as well as he does.
Slowly, she reaches out to put a hand on his arm.]
...do you wish for me to put that from my mind? We do not need to discuss it if you are not comfortable.
[Sometimes you befriend some ancient fantasy Chinese wizards and they're all full of tragedy and/or very weird, weird things...
It's a considerate thing for her to say, though. And he doesn't rebuff the touch, either - rather, it has him glancing back toward her, a (smaller than usual, but still present) smile on his face.]
You're very kind, Flayn. Thank you. [He means it, sincerely. That said:] I think I'd rather dispel any questions you may have before laying it to rest, though.
[He could, if he wanted, answer this with a simple "yes". He could - he almost does.
...But he pauses, because it means something that of all the things she could have asked, it was this, even if he doesn't immediately leap to her worrying about the state of his immortal soul. He just thinks it's her kindness, fretting for the justice Mo Xuanyu may or may not have gotten. And then, he nods.]
Mo Xuanyu, Mo Xuanyu... I don't know much about the details, but he was in a difficult situation. That clan of his - well, you saw just a bit of it, and he lived like that for about as long as I was dead. You have to be unbearably desperate to do what he did. [...] He wished for the annihilation of the ones who did him the worst harm. I got by on a technicality.
[Since his inventions were involved in their deaths, even if he wasn't, directly... Wild times.]
It isn't terribly surprising, given... the memory. She wishes it was avoidable, and really doesn't want to think too much about what sort of harm Mo Xuanyu suffered, or what sort of death was heaped upon the people who harmed him.
[He-- blinks, visibly surprised for a split-second. Two surprising statements in as many minutes from Flayn, today! She's asking if he'll be safe. If he'll be safe?
There's probably a point in here where his brain just shortcircuits for a second trying to process that, and he blinks again, owlish, before his head cants to the side.]
--I will be, yes. I fulfilled the contract even if it wasn't in exactly the most direct of terms, so this body is in my care now.
[Well, whatever it is - he will have to wait a little longer to find out, because before Flayn can finish speaking, they're thrust into another memory.
Wei Wuxian will find himself viewing he is viewing a battle through her eyes.
...not just viewing, either. She was - and he is, in this moment - in the thick of things. The sound of metal striking against metal, of anguished screams as weapons cut past armor and into skin, rages around from all directions. At the center of the plains, a grizzled, armored man wielding a sword made of bone that somehow manages to expand and snap like a whip advances toward a green-haired, furious woman.
"Lady Seiros," one of the members of their army breathes as he falls. Flayn - Wei Wuxian - steps toward him, and stretches out a hand that is gripping a staff that may look familiar, but there is a pressure on her shoulder, and firm hands draw her back from the conflict at the middle of the battle. She glances back into the stern face of a man that he won't recognize, but who bears a resemblance to her in terms of hair and eye color. He shakes his head; that other man is already dead.
What the army lacks in numbers - and it does, despite how large it looks; Nemesis's forces outnumber them by far - Seiros seems to make up for in strength. She meets the vicious foe blow for blow, and Flayn shakes off the man's hand from her shoulder at the sound of screaming from elsewhere on the battle field so that she can run to where soldiers are facing off against soldiers.
It's these wounded that she tends to, as Seiros battles the other army's leader. And there are almost too many of them to count. Some lives she manages to save. Others, she cannot.
She tended to her allies on the field of battle, until she exhausted all her strength—
It's almost too simplistic a retelling. It isn't just her own strength she exhausts. A healer makes an easy target, and the enemy forces don't hold back. She had meant it, during the very first trial here, when she said that the stab wound wasn't the worst she'd had - she defends herself from what blows she can, grits her teeth and bears the blows she cannot, and saps the strength from her enemies to knit her own wounds back together as she tries desperately to save even just one more person.
But there are only so many times that Nosferatu can rescue her, and only so many wounds she can possibly heal. There's only so far she can run to try and escape the soldiers who are faster and stronger than her. An arrow has pierced her back; a sword has struck clean through her stomach, and the soldier wielding it wrenches it away. Her blood splatters the ground, and she tries to take a breath.
Gods, but she can feel her life slipping away from her.
"Cethleann!" She is vaguely aware of a lance piercing straight through the swordsman, of him being knocked aside into one of his allies. There's an indistinct form above her, but she can't focus on their face. "No. No!"
Her vision blurs, and then turns to black. She feels something wet on her face - tears? Blood? - but she can't tell what it is.
"Cethleann, open your eyes! Please!"
...when they open their eyes again, they're back by the pool.]
[Wei Wuxian is no stranger to battlefields, at least. The stench of blood doesn't overwhelm him. Dying cries, desperate screams - the only part that startles him is the suddenness of it, and even that fades quickly, with how used to these leaking memories he is.
It's everything else that he didn't anticipate. He remembers Flayn talking earlier, about schools and white magic and training for a battlefield that surely she doesn't need training for. Surely not, with how surely they moved through the carnage. Weaved through the bodies. Delivered care with precision, knowing that it wouldn't be enough for everyone.
To work through the pain and the rain of attacks, to keep trying until it was physically impossible... He blinks at the clear pool water around his legs, and looks over toward Flayn. Cethleann? There's a lot he could start with, but first:]
[She can't really fault him for wondering that, given how the memory had ended. If she wasn't exactly who she was - what she was - it would have meant her death. Had it ended just a little differently...]
[War! Huh!!! What is it good for! (For almost dying.)]
I agree, I agree... A long-lasting era of peace would be ideal! [Too bad humans are so human!!] ...How did things turn out, after that one?
[He hesitates to ask, just a bit. But considering how long she'd presumably been asleep, he can only imagine how much changed between the time she passed out and the time she woke up again. Surely no war would last over a thousand years.]
[Honestly, he doesn't even think there's such a thing as a truly, fully peaceful era. "There are some things that are concerning" is probably the best any of them will ever get, barring the existence of a wild utopia out there somewhere...
He smiles, some measure of relief in it.]
I'm glad for that. [Imagine falling asleep for 1k+ years and waking up in the middle of The Next Big War wow.] Have you had much time to adjust to the way the world is, yet? Or is it still new to you?
[She gets an inquisitive look at the pause, but he decides not to press about it.]
Mm - well. If that's the last situation the two of you were in together before you woke up, then I can understand it.
[Losing a sibling is, after all, a horrific, gut-wrenching, life-changing experience. Coming close isn't as bad, but it's no walk in the park, either.]
Still, it's no good to keep you cooped up away from the world forever.
I would hope not! It was quite the harrowing experience. The only good thing about it was what came after— my brother finally allowed me to enroll in the Officers Academy.
[sighs]
As a result, I have been able to see much more of the world since then. Our missions and assignments have frequently taken us outside the monastery's walls.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
fishingforcompliments) wrote2020-06-07 04:18 pm
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She can relate to the tension in his shoulders and the way he's not looking at her, though. Everyone has things they'd rather not discuss - she knows that just as well as he does.
Slowly, she reaches out to put a hand on his arm.]
...do you wish for me to put that from my mind? We do not need to discuss it if you are not comfortable.
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It's a considerate thing for her to say, though. And he doesn't rebuff the touch, either - rather, it has him glancing back toward her, a (smaller than usual, but still present) smile on his face.]
You're very kind, Flayn. Thank you. [He means it, sincerely. That said:] I think I'd rather dispel any questions you may have before laying it to rest, though.
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There's been one thing in particular that she can't help but worry over, at least a little, even as unsettling as the rest of all of it is.]
Were you ever able to discover what his wish was...?
[Or is his soul still in danger of being annihilated?]
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...But he pauses, because it means something that of all the things she could have asked, it was this, even if he doesn't immediately leap to her worrying about the state of his immortal soul. He just thinks it's her kindness, fretting for the justice Mo Xuanyu may or may not have gotten. And then, he nods.]
Mo Xuanyu, Mo Xuanyu... I don't know much about the details, but he was in a difficult situation. That clan of his - well, you saw just a bit of it, and he lived like that for about as long as I was dead. You have to be unbearably desperate to do what he did. [...] He wished for the annihilation of the ones who did him the worst harm. I got by on a technicality.
[Since his inventions were involved in their deaths, even if he wasn't, directly... Wild times.]
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It isn't terribly surprising, given... the memory. She wishes it was avoidable, and really doesn't want to think too much about what sort of harm Mo Xuanyu suffered, or what sort of death was heaped upon the people who harmed him.
But...]
So... you will be safe, then?
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There's probably a point in here where his brain just shortcircuits for a second trying to process that, and he blinks again, owlish, before his head cants to the side.]
--I will be, yes. I fulfilled the contract even if it wasn't in exactly the most direct of terms, so this body is in my care now.
[Pats his own chest!]
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[Well, whatever it is - he will have to wait a little longer to find out, because before Flayn can finish speaking, they're thrust into another memory.
Wei Wuxian will find himself viewing he is viewing a battle through her eyes.
...not just viewing, either. She was - and he is, in this moment - in the thick of things. The sound of metal striking against metal, of anguished screams as weapons cut past armor and into skin, rages around from all directions. At the center of the plains, a grizzled, armored man wielding a sword made of bone that somehow manages to expand and snap like a whip advances toward a green-haired, furious woman.
"Lady Seiros," one of the members of their army breathes as he falls. Flayn - Wei Wuxian - steps toward him, and stretches out a hand that is gripping a staff that may look familiar, but there is a pressure on her shoulder, and firm hands draw her back from the conflict at the middle of the battle. She glances back into the stern face of a man that he won't recognize, but who bears a resemblance to her in terms of hair and eye color. He shakes his head; that other man is already dead.
What the army lacks in numbers - and it does, despite how large it looks; Nemesis's forces outnumber them by far - Seiros seems to make up for in strength. She meets the vicious foe blow for blow, and Flayn shakes off the man's hand from her shoulder at the sound of screaming from elsewhere on the battle field so that she can run to where soldiers are facing off against soldiers.
It's these wounded that she tends to, as Seiros battles the other army's leader. And there are almost too many of them to count. Some lives she manages to save. Others, she cannot.
She tended to her allies on the field of battle, until she exhausted all her strength—
It's almost too simplistic a retelling. It isn't just her own strength she exhausts. A healer makes an easy target, and the enemy forces don't hold back. She had meant it, during the very first trial here, when she said that the stab wound wasn't the worst she'd had - she defends herself from what blows she can, grits her teeth and bears the blows she cannot, and saps the strength from her enemies to knit her own wounds back together as she tries desperately to save even just one more person.
But there are only so many times that Nosferatu can rescue her, and only so many wounds she can possibly heal. There's only so far she can run to try and escape the soldiers who are faster and stronger than her. An arrow has pierced her back; a sword has struck clean through her stomach, and the soldier wielding it wrenches it away. Her blood splatters the ground, and she tries to take a breath.
Gods, but she can feel her life slipping away from her.
"Cethleann!" She is vaguely aware of a lance piercing straight through the swordsman, of him being knocked aside into one of his allies. There's an indistinct form above her, but she can't focus on their face. "No. No!"
Her vision blurs, and then turns to black. She feels something wet on her face - tears? Blood? - but she can't tell what it is.
"Cethleann, open your eyes! Please!"
...when they open their eyes again, they're back by the pool.]
no subject
It's everything else that he didn't anticipate. He remembers Flayn talking earlier, about schools and white magic and training for a battlefield that surely she doesn't need training for. Surely not, with how surely they moved through the carnage. Weaved through the bodies. Delivered care with precision, knowing that it wouldn't be enough for everyone.
To work through the pain and the rain of attacks, to keep trying until it was physically impossible... He blinks at the clear pool water around his legs, and looks over toward Flayn. Cethleann? There's a lot he could start with, but first:]
--You've died, too?
[A natural conclusion to draw, of course.]
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[She can't really fault him for wondering that, given how the memory had ended. If she wasn't exactly who she was - what she was - it would have meant her death. Had it ended just a little differently...]
Not... exactly. [...] I... fell asleep.
[1088 year long nap.]
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Since Wei Wuxian has a braincell despite looking like he doesn't, things click into place quickly.]
So back then--
[When he'd talked about a long sleep, and she's reacted like he'd just near slapped her... His expression creases.]
...I'm sorry, if that upset you.
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It is quite alright - it is not as if it was intentional...
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[God he has a real KNACK for just saying things that are verbal punches without meaning to. Very funny.]
--I'm sorry that you've had to go through that, too. War is just - hah.
[It's just the worst of all things human and human-like, isn't it? Hm.]
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[There's a reason she's (mostly) a pacifist! It's literally this shitty-ass war she nearly died in.]
And when they cannot be, they should be ended as quickly as possible.
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I agree, I agree... A long-lasting era of peace would be ideal! [Too bad humans are so human!!] ...How did things turn out, after that one?
[He hesitates to ask, just a bit. But considering how long she'd presumably been asleep, he can only imagine how much changed between the time she passed out and the time she woke up again. Surely no war would last over a thousand years.]
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[hmm.]
It is... more peaceful now than it was. There are some things that are concerning, but - nothing like... that battle.
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He smiles, some measure of relief in it.]
I'm glad for that. [Imagine falling asleep for 1k+ years and waking up in the middle of The Next Big War wow.] Have you had much time to adjust to the way the world is, yet? Or is it still new to you?
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[stupid, overprotective seteth.]
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Because of time restraints? Obligations? Or because of something else...?
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[she hesitates]
...my brother. He is terribly protective of me.
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Mm - well. If that's the last situation the two of you were in together before you woke up, then I can understand it.
[Losing a sibling is, after all, a horrific, gut-wrenching, life-changing experience. Coming close isn't as bad, but it's no walk in the park, either.]
Still, it's no good to keep you cooped up away from the world forever.
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[...
Well, she didn't actually mean to doxx that, but. It's already out, she can't take it back.]
Better to see the world and learn to defend myself.
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I - well. I can't disagree with that in the least, if that's the sort of danger you get up to! Flayn...!
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I only mean— danger can find you no matter what sorts of precautions you might take. So why live your life without ever truly living it?
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[HE REALLY DOES so he can't argue with her at all. All the same, he's shaking his head a little...]
But I also don't think being kidnapped from a monastery is something most people have as a part of their life, you know?
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[sighs]
As a result, I have been able to see much more of the world since then. Our missions and assignments have frequently taken us outside the monastery's walls.
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