Queen of Shadows

[Zephrun’s Imperium]

Something broke within Astral. Connections were Shattered. All her power, slipping in a terrifying instant. "Road! Use the sand!" she shouted. And then... nothing. 

[RoadWalker]

Road quickly emptied the tube, his hands shaking. He held up the grain of sand and concentrated. As his eyes closed, a mental wave came crashing against his consciousness. He fought to stand firm, but the overwhelming force of the wall pushing his mind was so heavy. This was the hardest thing he'd ever attempted. He could feel the life of the thread pouring into the speck of sand, all the complicated emotions and thoughts. He used the Connection's energy to hold the wave back. His mental entity entered the sand's Void. Instantly he regained awareness of his surroundings.

Road snapped his eyes open and looked around. Astral and Xino had vanished. "Astral?!" he cried, running to where they had stood just seconds ago. There was no sign of them anywhere. "Xino?!"

His scar began to pulse violently, sending freezing hot waves across his body. Road looked down at himself. His hand began to glow, then up his arm, slowly across his entire body until he outshone the sun above him. He began to lift off the ground several feet, growing ever brighter. The piercing glare fragmented across the battlefield like broken shards of glass refracting light. 

And then Narrator Roadwalker was gone in the blink of an eye.

The grain of sand fell to the ground and was lost among the tall field grass.

Edited April 3, 2019 by RoadWalker

[xinoehp512]

Quote

Astral and Xino never vanished...

-the world exploded with threads.

Hundreds of them, swirling every which way, of differing lengths. Antonio looked at these and knew- this was what everything that was was made out of.

He gasped silently, awed. Never in his entire life had he dreamed he would see such a sight as this.

With a start, he realized that he and Rekaerb were drifting towards one of the threads. As they approached, he noticed another, smaller thread tying them to the larger strand. He had just enough time to wonder what that was before-

-reality popped into existence around him, forming a battlefield of hundreds of shadowy creatures. Off to the side, he could see a tremendous stone giant laying defeated on the ground.

He gasped again, still silently. What was this?

Off to the side, he saw Rekaerb staring off into the distance at the stone giant. His expression was horrified.

"No," he whispered. "No!"

Antonio was suddenly distracted by a figure running across the field towards the stone giant and the two figures nearby. He couldn't see it clearly, but it looked strange, as if it were...

All of a sudden he felt the presence of Silence. Had that always been there? Or had it just appeared?

Regardless, now he knew. He was in the presence of one of the Masters of Silence, a skill level a lowly mime like him could only dream of. He bowed respectfully, by instinct, even though the figure probably wasn't paying attention to him. 

But why was he going to the fallen stone warrior?

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More of this later, have to post now.

 

Edited April 2, 2019 by xinoehp512

[RoadWalker]

17 hours ago, xinoehp512 said:

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Astral and Xino never vanished...

 

I know  but that's what it looks like from Road's perspective...

White. Black. White. Black.
It surrounded him, enveloped him, became him. Blinding splinters of it hung in the air about him, ever shifting and changing in their shapes and sizes. Then in the instant it appeared, the Darkest Light left him.
What's happening? he thought. Road turned and spotted a monster running towards him. He quickly summoned Whistle, but just as the sword began to form the strangest thing occurred. The monster ran right through him. Road cringed and fell backwards startled; the monster hadn't even seemed to notice him. It just kept on galloping towards the fight. Road took a moment to collect his Thoughts. Nothing felt off or out of place, he felt fine, his scar still roped its way across his shoulder, Whistle still came when he called it... So what was wrong?

Then it dawned on him. He had become a Strand in the Thread.

This is the answer, he understood now. Control. We could be killing ourselves on purpose. He couldn't see any fellow Narrators around. In fact, it seemed as if the monsters were fighting the very air in front of them.

Where have I gone? Can't I slow down this mad journey I'm on? He summoned his mug and gulped down the tea inside thirstily.

He stopped. He looked down at his mug. Did he narrate himself to drink that tea at that particular moment? All of this was planned by himself without him even knowing what was going to happen. Has it always been like this? he wondered. His head hurt from finding all this out. Road was frightened. Could he will himself to be killed? Would he?

He was still a Narrator, yet part of this epic tale, a character dictating his actions and words, his very Thoughts. He was Narrating himself.

Could he feasibly narrate the Narrator?

Edited April 3, 2019 by RoadWalker

[xinoehp512]

Okay. That's what I thought, but then the whole battlefield would have vanished to him as well, so...

The figure heard the words of thought spoken by the Vanished One. It smiled. Truth this one had found.

Fools the Narrators were, to make themselves characters in their own story. For how could a story be if the character could just will away the conflict? For that, come it had. Lied they had, to themselves. Unlike itself, no limitations they faced. 

It came to make them face truth. Only by accepting limitations could this story ever blossom.

The stone giant approached. With it, the one on the strange horse-beast. He reached out another hand, ready to do as done before he had.

@Ghanderflaffle

Antonio took a closer look at the giant as the creature approached it. With a start, he recognized it. What was Xinoehp doing here?

None of this made any sense in any way. But the one thing he did know was that he needed the bag Rekaerb was holding. So he began running over to where he stood, miming supplications in case he decided to turn his way and listen.

[Zephrun’s Imperium]

6 hours ago, RoadWalker said:

I know  but that's what it looks like from Road's perspective...

White. Black. White. Black.
It surrounded him, enveloped him, became him. Blinding splinters of it hung in the air about him, ever shifting and changing in their shapes and sizes. Then in the instant it appeared, the Darkest Light left him.
What's happening? he thought. Road turned and spotted a monster running towards him. He quickly summoned Whistle, but just as the sword began to form the strangest thing occurred. The monster ran right through him. Road cringed and fell backwards startled; the monster hadn't even seemed to notice him. It just kept on galloping towards the fight. Road took a moment to collect his Thoughts. Nothing felt off or out of place, he felt fine, his scar still roped its way across his shoulder, Whistle still came when he called it... So what was wrong?

Then it dawned on him. He had become a Strand in the Thread.

This is the answer, he understood now. Control. We could be killing ourselves on purpose. He couldn't see any fellow Narrators around. In fact, it seemed as if the monsters were fighting the very air in front of them.

Where have I gone? Can't I slow down this mad journey I'm on? He summoned his mug and gulped down the tea inside thirstily.

He stopped. He looked down at his mug. Did he narrate himself to drink that tea at that particular moment? All of this was planned by himself without him even knowing what was going to happen. Has it always been like this? he wondered. His head hurt from finding all this out. Road was frightened. Could he will himself to be killed? Would he?

He was still a Narrator, yet part of this epic tale, a character dictating his actions and words, his very Thoughts. He was Narrating himself.

Could he feasibly narrate the Narrator?

6

You capitalized Thoughts! YAY!

[old man moomba]

  "And there it goes." Dapper muttered "Once again, the Meta causes collapse." The Meta, a symptom of Narration. All Narators had to face it, but only the strongest, smartest, and totally nsane Narrators could survive it and remain a Narrator. 

The others, well, one could call them alive. They retained sentience, at least. Dapper sighed, he had faced the Meta long ago, but had rationalized it, retaining this form. Of course, that rationalization was slowly driving him crazy, but that was minor. The Being above him could just create another body for him when he finally broke.

Infinity, that was his rationalization. There were an infinite number of levels, each containing a Being which conrolled the level below it and was controlled by the level above it. There was a top... somewhere. And since Dapper controlled reality, this wasn't a theory. It simply was. 

[xinoehp512]

The figure ran behind the one on horseback. As it ran, it thought.

Another one had found truth- in a way. He saw himself as an infinite ladder, with each Narrator being Narrated by the ones above it, eventually all tying back to- presumably- the Author.

The figure knew this was not, not for itself. It was part of a collection of Narrator beings. Sometimes they would narrate each other, sometimes themselves- but none were the Author, for the Author could not reside within the world. They were the ultimate Narrator, and they were tied to concept of reality that was far beyond even infinitely larger than the reality it and other characters experienced. Even the concept of an Author was suspect, due to the chaotic nature of this part of existence. In any case, the Author for him was not found "on top" of everything, but rather was everything. In a sense, he was the Narrators- all of them, together.

The figure brushed his hand up against the one riding, cutting her from Narration in an instant. A character only she was, now, as she had acted to be.

@Ghanderflaffle

Edited September 24, 2019 by xinoehp512

[RoadWalker]

On 4/3/2019 at 5:26 AM, xinoehp512 said:

Okay. That's what I thought, but then the whole battlefield would have vanished to him as well, so...

 

Currently, Roadwalker is only watching one side of the story: the enemy's point of view.

Edited April 6, 2019 by RoadWalker

[Ghanderflaffle]

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I've been targeted! Also, sorry I was at the state FFA convention.

Ghanderflaffle didn't notice the creature until it touched her, then she spun as the thing's magic (or whatever it is) started flowing through her.

She tried to flick the urumi at the creature but it disappeared as she lost her powers as a Narrator. She growled in frustration and turned to ride faster but Jaci, also being something that she summoned, disappeared with the circle of ghanderflaffle warriors.

Ghanderflaffle hit the ground hard and didn't get up.

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This is fun, I have no idea what to say so I improvise. 

@xinoehp512

Edited April 8, 2019 by Ghanderflaffle
Finishing

[RoadWalker]

Road Thought long and hard. If he was somehow able to narrate the Narrator, he could get them out of this chaotic scene. Of course they had the power to get back into this mess they created, but everyone had a choice.

But...he WAS the Narrator of his own story, which meant the Narrator needed to narrate the Narrator. This was the key. Each Narrator could Narrate themselves, but they couldn't entirely narrate someone else's story completely...there was free will involved. So even if he narrated himself out of the story...no one could ever bring him back.

They could live in a world of monsters and mindless narrations, each Strand being governed by a Stranded within. Or they could give up the most powerful source of control they'd ever had. The power to Narrate.

And in that small, single moment, Road knew what he needed to do.

He knelt and closed his eyes, reaching out to his surroundings one last time. He breathed in deeply, letting a wave of peace wash over him. It's time, his conscience echoed in his mind. Time to leave. He let the memories of his life fill his soul. The days of laughter, the days of darkness, every little moment flashed before him. The Darkest Light began to shine from his chest, glowing brighter than ever until Road's body was illuminated with pure white. He began to rise, lifting off the ground and hovering several feet above it.

He shed a single tear as he looked around at his fellow soldiers. Xeno, Ghanderflaffle, Star, Lunamor, Dr Dapper. They all had different paths to take, but he had found his at last.

...

"Aww STARS I forgot to drink the rest of my t-"

Then Roadwalker, Shadow Wind of Yesterday, Relinquished Control.

[Zephrun’s Imperium]

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Now that was a badcull necro.