|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 Posted: Tue Mar 10, 2009 4:43 am
 Past the throng of seaside villages, past the grand and royal palace which is settled in the hills, through the vast, moss-covered forest of old, there lies a village unknown to most.
Pass through several enchanted, stone gates hidden deep within the forest, and you will realize the scenery is changing before you. Suddenly, there is a great, still lake before you, with one long, red bridge that crosses it, disappearing into a thick mess of bamboo and large, gnarled trees with crimson leaves.
Should you venture across the bridge, you will notice how decorated it is, as if it were made for the gods alone to walk upon. And then you see it...and hear it. A large village nestled within the protective embrace of those crimson leaves. Paper lanterns are lit, music is being performed, and the smell of festival meats being cooked is thick in the air. It is the Lost Village, a sacred place where many soul-summonings take place.
Many spiritkind have spoken of the village as a myth, those who carry out the festival of candles each month, but they are much more than that.
Behind the village is a stone stairway, laid out upon the hillside. There is a large shrine at the top, with countless candles placed upon it. It is the Shrine of Candles. However, they are not common, household wax-sticks. Oh no. These are very special, you see...for one candle may be the guiding light which rouses a sleeping spirit to be born into this world, awakening them from their existence between the shadows and glimmers of light.
Should you choose to place a candle upon this shrine, you will have to purchase one from one of the Candle Makers who visit this village, during a Festival. There are several... One is a maiden of magic, and one is a girl who became two.
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Tue Aug 04, 2009 12:58 am
Chapter 1: Weeping Village
There is a story, old in age, which took place not far from our village. It tells of a girl with abnormal healing strengths, who would heal those sick in mind and body by taking their illness, their darkness, into herself. She was very kind, and very gentle. One day she fell in love with a man, but her love was not to be.
The man used and betrayed her in a way that left her shaken and shattered. In this betrayal, she could not contain her despair and suffering, and when that was released, the illness and darkness inside her, which had accumulated into bad spirits, was also released.
She became wicked only for a few moments, only injuring a man, but it was more than enough. The villagers became terrified that she would unleash their pain back upon them, so they captured her, and dragged her crying and screaming deep, deep below the ground, where she was sacrificed. Chains were bound to her neck and wrists, and she was strangled to death slowly, as such were the customs in those days for sacrifices.
She was left there, to die, to rot in the darkness, alone. As she died, she cursed the villagers with her last breath. Cursed them, with her dying wish. And cursed they were, for the moment she died, all the pain and suffering she took returned to the entire village ten fold, and the village was thus killed as she was.
Centuries passed... and though every year there was a festival held at this village to grant it peace, did it truly work?
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Tue Aug 04, 2009 1:25 am
Chapter 2: The birth of Ruin
(Summary of Metaplot Event 1)
During one such festival, where the residents of the Village of the Red Moon came to the Weeping Village, there was uncovered abnormalities in the forest surrounding the village.
It was dead, grayed with illness, which got worse and worse the closer they came to a strange area, where the roots spiraled around some sort of underground entrance.
Haveni, who had been out on her own at first, was followed by Avantea, who always thirsted for more knowledge and input. As the two searched for the promised Piece of Heart, Haveni began to hear voices calling out in the forest.
"I'm here...I'm here." They said. Frantic, she turned to Avantea, but the storyteller could not hear anything.
Haveni followed the voices into underground followed by Avantea, Kliment, and Girisha. It was there, that Haveni began to act strangely, speaking with a dual voice, asking if they were going to kill her.
And then, another, identical to her in appearance and voice, appeared behind her. She tore chains from her throat and wrists, which were bleeding from wounds left by them. She was the very presence of death, but why did she look so similar to Haveni?
As they tried to escape this vengeful ghost, they realized she was more corporeal than they thought. One touch and she turned a man violent and insane, but this ghost, who called herself Ruin, seemed to be after Haveni.
She claimed Haveni and her were one and the same, and she pleaded with Haveni to join with her, to send the world suffering in darkness, like it had sent them.
She seemed to inject Haveni with her plague-touch, giving her back the memories of the days when they were whole. Haveni went unconscious, and Ruin slipped away.
Unfortunately, the man Ruin had touched was beyond help, and too violent. In a valiant effort, Kliment ended his life to send him to peace.
The Nameless one appeared, and revealed that indeed, Haveni and Ruin were one person at a point in time, and that they must have split into two shortly after the original Haveni was killed. The bitter resent that Ruin felt is what kept her alive all this time, in a half-dead state. However, she couldn't help with anything more than that. Even she had no idea what to do about Ruin.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sun Nov 01, 2009 11:03 pm
Chapter 3: War on Hallow's Eve
It had been months and the candle maker was still asleep after the encounter with Ruin.
Life went on as usual even so, and those of the village were forming a festival. Joy and cheer was in the air, ah, the feel of a festival! However, these happy feelings were cut short as a strange group of outsiders appeared, and with them, many, many other spiritkind, who had been..cursed.
Nothing short of devastation happened after. The throng was led by one group in particular - Seir, who seemed to be the master of it, Aeos, who appeared to be the sword...Rosel, who, if aeos was the sword, she was the dagger who swept quickly out to deliver the ending blow. And finally, Noctis, the womanizing man of many belts and one mindset.
As destruction ensued, the sleeping candle maker awoke. She saved the few who remained in their destroyed village from Aeos, but she seemed too easy to turn her wrath onto the villagers themselves. She was unstable, and possessed by the dead - and possibly, Ruin.
A stalemate occured, and Haveni chose to go with those who had caused the destruction, knowing she was shunned by her village, and that she needed to find Ruin.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Wed Nov 25, 2009 3:23 am
Chapters 4 and 5: Curse me and Purification
Those who'd taken the girl had arrived in the port city of Priyal, followed by many others who had migrated from the Lost Village, which was being regenerated.
Revenge was on the mind of Nashara, who schemed with the twilif Sankke to cause fire to the inn which the big, bad evil guys were staying in. Chaos ensued, but luckily only wounds were received from the fire.
A battle sprung out between Nashara and Rosel, and the growing destruction and violence triggered Haveni to fall into her dark, possessed mode. While Noctis attempted to comfort her, she had cursed him, and sent him berserk. In the confusion and violence, Loki, Keanu, Rylia, Sankke, and Aeos were also cursed. Their friends and others tried to stay their anger, but it was almost useless.
Finally, Haveni came to, after the emotional shock of seeing the berserk Noctis force a kiss upon Seir. When his power had been absorbed by Seir, Haveni attempted to protect Noctis from the onslaught of Loki, but fled after the gunslinger shot at her. Eisha stepped in to take care of Loki, and told those remaining where to go to get the curse removed.
The Sigil Ruins.
Those cursed felt a calling to the place. Some journeyed alone, others with friends, some refused to answer the calling. Once they bested two trials they faced in the forest, they arrived, ensnared by the spell of the lantern witch, Ishka. The spell was a success, and they were freed from the curse, but would forever bear the memories of it, and kept a fraction of that power that was bestowed upon them.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Mon Mar 29, 2010 3:53 pm
The final Chapter of the Ruin Arc:
The cursed girl had ran as far as the city of Allestia, where she was recognized easily by the king, and imprisoned when she refused to grant him the power of the curse to his benefit.
She believed she would not be saved from that prison, but some indeed came for her. Azrai'iel, Rylia, Kiru, and the four who had thus accompanied her thus far, as well as Eisha and Loki, and a feral mercenary from the forest, Widdershin.
She'd been rescued, and they escaped into the Sigil Ruins. The peace was brief, however, as Haveni's body finally succumbed to the curse that was devouring her from the inside out, and Ruin appeared, offering her hand.
Haveni announced that while she had grown to love them, she had used those she traveled with, because she planned to merge with Ruin all along, and had counted on them to be able to kill her. She accepted Ruin's hand, and the two became on once more.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
