"A servant? A servant of August? The Witch-King?" Artemis posed, trying to pry further into this revelation.
She had been wearing the typical servant's attire that had been passed down through the traditions of the Blackbaast's history. This was why he first assumed she was a servant of another wing in the Palace, as he had never seen her before. After all, he did tend to spend most of his time obsessively securing the Guard's Wing...
"A servant of who...? I'm not sure... but I recall the feeling of my duties... they were harrowing, I think." Her hand reached towards her chest, curling up as she grimaced. "I didn't very much enjoy them, maybe even hated my circumstances..."
I can understand... the mood in the Palace is a very sullen one...
"However..." She reached into her servant's coat, procuring a small black booklet crammed to the brim with loose notes. "I've compiled a lot of things in here... I just need to take some time to study it."
"Alright, alright. Enough storytelling, my Lady. You're injured and distressed, so let's get you to bed."
Gardner suddenly hovered over the two of them. It seems that he had finally finished compiling the second cove.
He quickly ushered them towards it, forcing them to crawl inside. Once they had done so, snug within the slightly-larger space, Gardner peeked his head in with a faint grin.
"I'll keep watch out here. You just rest, little Lord. Fighting against the Fog Lord will be quite brutal."
Artemis nodded his head slowly, watching tentatively as Gardner slinked away, hearing the rustle of fabric and clank of metal as the gigantic man presumably sat down outside.
Tilting his head back against the side of the cove, Artemis shut his eyes loosely and calmly asked, "do you feel tired? Do you want to sleep first? I'll keep watch."
She shook her head.
"It's alright, I've only just rested. You... you sleep. I'll watch over you." Cia spoke a bit hesitantly, measuring her words. When he glanced over at her, she had tilted her head upwards and away, revealing the slight sharpness of her jaw, the smooth skin that reached down towards her collarbones. Her eyes deftly avoided his, trying not to meet them, hoping that they would leave her be.
And her cheeks were red-hot, flushed scarlet.
His expression shattered, suddenly feeling a bit embarrassed. He turned his head away and sunk down further towards the floor.
"Ah... thank you. Goodnight."
But even though it was his turn to rest finally, wracked by the endless agony he had experienced throughout the day, the turmoil and fatigue that had weighed his body down suddenly ceasing for a moment, he couldn't bear to close his eyes.
Was his... heart beating a little faster?
But even though this strange interaction warmed him up a bit, the cold air quickly eased him into a deep sleep.
He dreamt about his waking life while he was curled up next to Cia. He dreamt of these two new companions of his, whom he neither completely trusted nor overwhelmingly cared for, but depended upon anyway.
However, it was a strangely different scene from what he had grown used to in the past day. He had appeared in the Guard's Wing of the Palace he had grown up in, deep in the Capital City of Henem, the largest city in the entire continent of the Blackbaast.
The crow-haired giant of a man accompanied him as a knight, clad in the silver armour most commonly worn by the Guards of the Palace. In this Palace, Naasis, he was acting as a Guard to the Prince and Captain of the Guards, Artemis!
Beside him on his right, acting as the Prince's attendant, Cia wore a bright and colourful gown with a flowing lace skirt. Her lengths of red-and-black hair had been twisted up into a bun behind her head, and there was a small blossoming red haemanthus tucked behind her ear.
Artemis stared at her for a long moment, observing each key detail of the sight of her. Of course, this wasn't to discern her, he had already tried that. It was more just because he felt like he wanted to...
He knew this was a dream. Because of [Eyes of Discernment], it had become quite easy for him to break through the lies of illusions or dreams. While he could discern things in reality, in dreams it didn't seem to remain the case. He first tried it on Cia and Gardner, and then on objects around him, but nothing of note was brought up at all.
Artemis was still missing his left eye and his arm, but that didn't seem to matter to the people that surrounded them. Guards he had known throughout his career as Captain shot him careful, respectful glances, and the servants and attendants that wisped about often bowed or stared at him with interesting, almost devoted gazes.
There was also something of vastly important detail, something that couldn't possibly be overlooked in any circumstance.
A titanic tree towered over the city, something which hadn't been present in the real Capital.
The tree's bark was a vibrant pitch-black, a colour that seemed to make itself perfectly known to him, insisting that it was there, that he should gaze at it. The surface of the bark was gnarled, coruscating gamboge sparks flitting off of its surface in a hail of radiance. A crown of branches, not unlike the size of the Ivory Tree in the shadow, covered a large portion of the city in the silhouette it cast. Each of these blackened branches were completely devoid of leaves, and the smaller branches shot out from the main ones like violent thorny brambles.
He stared up at the tree mindlessly. It seemed like the other two had experienced the same urge.
"It's very beautiful this time of day, isn't it?" Cia echoed his unspoken sentiment.
"Ah, yes..." Artemis responded, shaken from his thoughts.
"It just makes you want to enter its shadow, doesn't it?" Gardner spoke in a calm, slightly-humoured tone.
His eyes moved downwards, towards the shadow that the tree cast. One of the branches of treacherous thorns stretched out like a pallid wisp of darkness, placed right before his feet.
It would certainly be... nice, wouldn't it? To be enveloped in this shadow? He did feel quite warm, it might even help to cool him down...
"Just follow my lead!"
Cia suddenly gave him a big smile, stepping backwards into the shadowed branch of the Ebony Tree.
Her skin, which had been darkened by shadow, suddenly crumbled. Each section of her skin was divided as it became as viscous and thin as liquid, splashing down onto the ground in an array of vibrant, faded, and sharp colours. Her arm was blues, her left shoulder a collage of greens. Her head had become yellows, either golden or vibrant dandelions, and her fingers were pastel violets.
In an instant she had become a portraiture in the shadow of the Ebony Tree.
And when Gardner quickly followed, before Artemis could even comprehend what had happened to Cia, he too became horror. His flesh peeled back and balled up in one long, twisted strip atop his head. Thousands of writhing worms spilled from the empty eyelids of his skull, burgeoning and twisting outwards into fingers and toes, forming thousands of limbs which ran up his body, attaching themselves to various parts. When those limbs no longer had any room to blossom from his body, they attached themselves to other limbs, sprouting out like branches of flesh.
The shadow ran over his skin in the next instant. He felt his bones go ice-cold.
His eyes ran over the Ebony tree in the distance, shaking as red text outlined itself in front of him.
"[Name: Name: Name: Name?]
[Status: As is, shall all be. I shall be all. All shall be.]
[Lineage: 'It' has the Ability to showcase your true nature.]
[Aspec(t): The King! The King is coming! He's going to return! The True King! I love the "True King"!]
[Super-special Ability: I remember when Daemon taught me about texting. I couldn't fathom how it could all fit into that little screen. Dragon also seemed excited, even though he didn't want to show it. You had the oddest look on your face, Prince. It was like you had discovered another world for the third time or something! Ha!]
[Spirit Contract: Hey, have you ever heard of Tokyo? There's a city like it, someplace far away from here. I admire its night-life. I often enjoyed... well, we often enjoyed it there. Can you remember, those nights in Tokyo? Poor Daemon, her nights were stressful. But she enjoyed that time with us. Do you remember that smile? That gorgeous smile. I once thought there that I could fall in love. That there was no more need to be crazy... do you remember yet, Artemis?]
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[General Description:]
There is a giant tree resting over Henem, the Capital City. Its bark is pitch-black and gnarled, and it is completely devoid of leaves.
It is merely a reflection of what once was, what will be, and what already has been, yet still is. Because it is that sort of person, that sort of tree, that longs to be anything less than a God.
But its very nature is corruption, yet also eternity. So its shadow is a plague, it births the very essence of degeneration in someone's body. It creates an entirely different Core.
What shall it name this phenomenon? It has created children of them all, isn't this the very Aspect of its being?
Aspect... it is very turbulent. It destroys them from within. Don't you think that's beautifully grotesque? I would despise myself for this creation, if I hadn't forgotten how to hate long ago...
This tree experiences true madness. Its Aspect had blossomed long ago. It had become true Decay.
Do you remember yet, Artemis? That Aspect I created as a joke, yet threw to the bottom of the world to see if there was anything down there? Can you believe they made a King of it? They even named it, when I had forgotten to. I can see it now, all of the souls it has started to claim. Only one. Only a Witch-King.
===