ximilia | text / un: starkov

the good news first: rhys and i found the princess of kilnan in the castle and woke her. she's with us right now. the castle was designed to protect her against her mother's soldiers trying to force her back home, which is why it's been so tricky. it's meant to alert remi — her uncle, and the wizard we came looking for — to any unwanted guests, which would be us.

the reason he hasn't come to greet us is that he's asleep. aureliah — the princess — should be able to talk her uncle down before he throws us all out into the mud. he's trapped behind an entrance sam's group found, but aureliah should be able to unseal its magic.

i think more of us should be there when it's opened, just in case something goes wrong with the orb.

the bad news: the orb's name is phyllie. remi made a deal with her and fed his own arcane energy to her in exchange for curing a curse that was placed on aureliah and her mother, but something went wrong during remi's bargain and that energy was transferred from the orb to aureliah instead. that's the reason she has her uncle's magic, and why her mother is so eager to use her daughter as a weapon against kilnan's neighboring countries.

the queen thinks kilnan will be better protected if she can force her daughter to learn war magic. it sounds like remi has been searching through dimensions to find the "right world" (for him and aureliah to hide? we don't know what he meant) but the orb has been draining him of his energy.

from what aureliah said, he feeds "phyllie" monthly. the princess and i think that's the price he's chosen to pay for keeping the curse at bay.

the worst news: i don't know what will happen if we break the bargain remi has made, but i'm sure it can't possibly be anything good. aureliah's life force was given to her by the orb, and the wizard who cast the curse in the first place was killed in the war. so that's a dead end, but maybe someone has a better solution we can offer remi once he's awake.

[ as per this npc thread! feel free to threadjack and hop around threads here to your hearts' content. ♥ ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ There's so much going on and the lack of decent sleep plus being constantly on edge is doing Peter no favors. This whole mess with the orb reminds him far too much of Ego for his own liking. But he tries to appreciate Alina's efforts before giving his opinion. ]

Ey Alina, great job discovering all this information, I'm sure it wasn't easy.

I think Bucky's idea is the most sound. The orb wants to be whole after all, and being together with the others means it's not going to run out of power.

Trying to collectively give it power is an ill decision, the orb takes more than we can give, and it's not sustainable even as a short-term solution. It will only mean more people in danger and the orb getting stronger, probably demanding more power or more deals.

This castle has been abandoned for more than just a few weeks, if you ask me. Do we even know if the Queen is still alive?

it wasn't too difficult. and i had help.

[ will she ever learn the art of accepting compliments? not likely. ]

the queen has been sending soldiers and something called dreamwalkers to try to take aureliah. now, whether she's still even awake ... i don't have an answer for that.

the orb takes more than one person can give on their own. as a team, we might actually stand a chance.

Still, this is going to help us a lot. Say thanks to your help from me, please.

[ All the more reason for people to keep complimenting her.

And Since this conversation is taking place before Drift left Peter with no choice but to agree to the plan of using people to handle the orb, he's still not sold on the idea.]

Or we all might end bound to a, now super-powered, alien orb.

A few years ago someone I was, well, not exactly close to me but important, tried to use me like this. Back then, I just had discovered that I had powers, and he tried to use me as a battery to increase his own and hurt a lot of people. [ Does that sound familiar to Alina? ] I don't want that to happen here. We can't be sure that we will be able to control the orb or get rid of it when the time comes.

we all came here to gather the orbs in exchange for fixing our mistakes. you could say we're all already bound to every orb we've collected.

[ if nothing else, this mission has forced her to uncomfortably examine the deals they've made — to finally soak in the consequences of what her desperation has done. despite the stubborn, hopeful flicker that refuses to be snuffed out — she can't cast aside her doubts, now, over the contract they've trapped themselves in. ]

i'm sorry about what was done to you. [ and its uneasy familiarity. a stab of guilt prickles at her, for her failure to warn that kirigan is no better than those who have betrayed peter in the past — but why would he even choose to believe her? ] i won't ask you to do this. i won't ask it of anyone who isn't willing to try. but i'm not going to change my mind, if we discover there's no other way.

Ehhh, yes and no. The Braccia orb we collected a couple of months ago wasn't using someone's magic and life force to sustain itself, and we didn't have to do this. It's just that this seems like a recipe for disaster to me and a worrisome precedent. What if the orbs in the future keep asking more and more?

I already brought up my concerns to Viveca, but she couldn't really give me an answer. She asked for a chance, that we trust her and the Commander because she said they had the best intentions in mind.

[ But the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and Peter has grown to be more skeptical with the years. His expression softens at her sympathy, and he looks more tired than anything. ]

Thanks. It was some time ago, but some lessons are learned the hard way. I know you wouldn't ask that from me, but what I am trying to say is that you don't have to sacrifice yourself either. Is your life not worth the same as mine? As anybody else's? We don't know yet if there's no other way, it's too soon.

no, but we did sign a contract to undo our regret. what else do you think they'll ask for, once we've collected them all?

[ true monsters always believe they have the best intentions, after all. that's another lesson learned the hard way. ]

what makes you so certain i'm sacrificing myself? we don't know what the orb would ask for. it demands different things from different people.

it's just an option to consider if we run out of other choices. everyone is asking like i'm going to throw myself at the orb right this second.

If I am honest with you, I thought I was just dreaming when I agreed to this whole thing. [ He can at least admit that. Peter is willing to go through the missions and help others with their goals but he wants to err on the side of caution as well. ] I meant that the next orb we encounter could ask for something we might not be willing to give, not that the orbs will keep asking things once they're reunited and complete. And talking about that...I'm also worried that once they are all together, they will be too strong for the Commander and for us to control.

I don't know, that's the thing. And I'd rather not gamble with your life or your free will, Alina.

[ Just accept that people care, lady! That last bit, though, makes Peter huffs out a small laugh. ]

Ah, well...plenty of heroes and the like here. We all would do that sort of stupid self-sacrifices, so he can identify the patterns.

text / un: starkov

Text | Un: Star-Lord

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