Part 28: Mini-Update: Stories Thirteen Through Sixteen
Here's the last of the stories. The next game update is scheduled for Sunday because lucky me has class 4-5 days a week now
Mini-Update: Stories Thirteen Through Sixteen
Richard - Inner Voice posted:
"Please stop, Your Majesty! The war and such..."
"Damned annoying scoundrel! Put him in jail!"
Having said that, I turned and left. Once I was certain I was out of sight, I leaned against the wall. As sweat rolled down my cheek, a moment of clarity hit.
"What's wrong? My...body won't obey me. Did I really say that I desired war?"
Somewhere within, I could hear a voice...grieving at the path I had chosen.
"Shut up!"
Muttering, I chased away the voice of reason within me. However, I was startled when a different voice answered.
"I'm very sorry about this, Your Majesty."
I had nearly exposed my cover, saved only by my indistinct muttering.
"Ernest? What's wrong?"
"What shall we do with Princess Letitia? We still have the means to use her as a bargaining chip in negotiations for reparations...avoiding war."
"Out of the question> Attempting to assassinate me should not be rewarded with money or territory!"
"So we are to go to war, no matter what?"
"Once they know the pain of war, they will not try something so foolish again."
"As you will, Highness. Then what of the Princess?"
"Keep her from my sight. I do not wish to see her...eyes. You are dismissed."
At my order, the knight hung his head low with a sigh.
"What's wrong? Leave already!"
Crushed by my tone, he left. As I watched him disappear from the room, the voice within me returned.
"Please, wait! Don't go, Ernest!"
Just then he turned the corner and was gone.
"Wait! Don't leave me alone!"
A scream leaked out from a dark corner of my soul, causing a sharp pain to tear through my skull.
I could not stop the putrid exhalation, and the stench overwhelmed the hall.
"I can't let this...thing defeat me. I have endured for 14 years...I cannot stop now."
Pushing myself from the wall, I began to walk again. A strong voice echoed in my head, as if to encourage me.
"That's right, Richard...my ambitions depend on you. I won't let you rest until they are accomplished."
"Yes, Master Gevel". As the sound of the heavy voice echoed within my head, the small voice within me fell silent.
Lyell - Determination posted:
"Gevel has been defeated."
I would deliver the news to my friend Kenshin privately. Only his footsteps echoed in the dark, dank passage.
"Ernest?"
Although he couldn't yet see me, the muttering voice of a boy could be heard from the innermost part of the jail.
The owner of the voice was sleeping, not on the simple bed, but spread-eagled on the stone floor.
"Richard?!"
"Don't make such a strange face. It's nothing..."
While quietly saying that, he closed his eyes. For a moment, it seemed as if he might disappear.
"Gevel...has been defeated."
"I know. I felt it when it happened. It was as if suddenly all the strength was sucked from my body. I fell to the ground and lacked the strength to get up."
As he related how his life was in danger, he spoke as if talking about another person.
"Can't you stand?"
"It's not that I lack the strength. It's just become a tiresome exercise."
He spoke in an expressionless tone of voice as he rose with some effort. It was a peculiar show of courage, coming from this frail boy.
I took off my glove and extended a hand into the iron latticework. Richard grasped it without hesitation. It was cold as stone, but strong.
The hand which grasped mine betrayed his true condition more than any voice could. He was silently fighting death...a painful death.
It was then I decided.
"I want to protect this person."
Even if it were to come at the cost of everything I had worked for, I would stand at his side.
Gina - Exasperation posted:
In a filthy underground cell, unable to get enough water, let alone food to satisfy him, a boy lay prostrate. The boy had been caught breaking into a landowner's manor.
"This is terrible..."
The man scowled while rising to fetch clean, hot water for the boy. The boy, a guard, and I waited. I moved closer and knelt at the boy's side.
"..."
He was moving his lips as if to say something, but no words were coming out.
"Come now! Surely you can't stand guard as this child suffers!"
"Once a brat has learned to steal, he'll steal again. You had best just let him die here...if you save him, he'll pay you back with vengeance."
"Shut up!"
The words were so sharp, they startled me. For the first time in my life, I screamed at the whim of my emotions.
"He had to steal in order to live! If his parents hadn't abandoned him, it wouldn't have been necessary."
I uttered the words without thinking...the words he had always said. He...
An awkward silence chilled the air. "He" broke it by bringing the hot water.
"What's wrong? What happened?!"
Moments later, we were walking back toward the city, the boy carried on his back already sleeping fitfully.
He said those simple words so suddenly. I was taken aback.
"You know...for what you what you said to the guard," he continued. "I...I just didn't want your conduct to be laughed at."
"Mmmm...yes. Well, instead of just defending me, I wish you truly understood how I think."
"Ah..."
I see...this is not giving up. His outlook was hopeful...always. Such is the excellence of humans.
"The more I know of your way, the happier I am. I...is it all right if I stay with you a little longer...to help?"
He took my hand with a smile. His hand was large and warm.
Gevel - Rebirth posted:
...Pish...
The sharp sound of cracking entered my consciousness. My thoughts, suspended in a frozen "death", began to awaken.
"...where is this place?"
I strained to look at my surroundings and soon realized I was restrained. Little by little, my memory returned. My body had been sealed within a magic crystal.
The humans that had given life to me, making me fight for their benefit, had sealed me when I was no longer of use.
Knowing that they lacked the power to take my life back, and fearing my strength, they sealed me within a magic crystal enriched with Grow to weaken me. It was an agony that far exceeded death.
Wave after wave of Grow in the crystal ate away at my body, and no matter how hard I tried to twist to avoid the onslaught, the crystal remained unforgiving in its restraint.
Would my life run out, or would the Grow dissipate first? In either case, the answer would not come for hundreds of years. Billions of agonizing seconds.
But, how much time has passed since then?
I had no reference point to guess how much time had passed. I could only see that my body and the crystal prison that held me had both thinned considerable.
...Pish...
Another sharp sound...the magic crystal was cracking before my eyes.
At least, the time had come...
It was time to hunt again. But this time, I would hunt with a plan...my plan. I will rule humans not through direct conquest, but by means of artifice. Yes...human society itself will become my target.
And with that realization, I shattered the thin wall of crystal that remained between me and my rebirth to power.