Blue Skies, And One Last Vigil (Farewell)
Jul 17, 2018 23:42:14 GMT -5
Melody Black, Cheshire, and 1 more like this
Post by Jian Oreachi on Jul 17, 2018 23:42:14 GMT -5
The dust of Hueco Mundo gathered around his feet soaking up the pool of blood fed by the constant drip of the remnants of his mangled arm. He took great sucking breaths and stared across the dunes to the fading form of the beast, a hell of a thing that had cost him his limb. It was comforting in a way, the sting of pain, the feeling of exhilaration and adrenaline that cut through the quiet and the numb. Solitude interrupted by bouts of great and terrible violence, 5 years was a long time and was more than his reckoning, it must have been an eternity ago since he stood on the other side of the boundary.
The Shinigami were dying, great numbers had went and gone and even as far from the world as he was he knew this to be so. The beasts knew too, he could feel their excitement, the sense of exhilaration that they might prey on a world bereft of defenders. A plague swept through the Gotei, one he'd been spared off, if not by providence than perhaps due to his fortunately timed exile. He was mortal once upon a time, that was his world beyond the veil, his duty. The Maiden, before she left, had told him that he was like her and that meant he was to the guard the pathways between. He didn't belong on Earth anymore, but that didn't mean he couldn't uphold that charge.
Five years. Maybe plus a day. Maybe more. His vigil took place almost on the day when he realized that he couldn't exist in the world of glass. It was when he realized that if he tried to live among them he'd try to control them. He was their guardian, not their master. He left for a place bereft of life which was perfect for someone whose only method to protect was destruction. Here his power required no checks, no balance, it could rage in all directions, against all things that it found, and it did. He scarred the land, left his mark again and again in a land so vast that none would ever see it. He wielded his power against monsters so vast in number that he could spend an eternity killing innumerable swarms and not even make a dent.
Days past rarely with thought, most times he didn't find a single creature, sometimes a pack of them hardly worth the effort, on the rarest of occasions an army the likes of which would destroy the whole Earth if they'd ever had the inclination and its defenders were absent. Even those too passed with no great effort. It was never one great battle that threatened him, it was the struggle of each day, the uncertainty of battles day in and day out, the absence of rest. His vigils first lesson was that his power was far from limitless. Early on he fought recklessly, wild, he embraced the freedom that his exile had given him and spent his power without concern. He burned bright, a supernova of fury and destruction. He drew upon his well with abandon believing it not to have an end, but it did.
Every day he could feel himself slow, ever slightly. Every day he could feel less of the spark inside him, he felt the energy slip through his fingers with every battle, a little less returning to him each day. He realized that there was an end, that one day his strength would leave him and that the only thing that held it at bay was how carefully he marshaled that use but never would it be enough. He never feared the creatures who gathered together, whether they existed in packs or countless multitudes and armies. Those creatures existed to exist, empty. Hollow.
The creatures that he feared shared company with none, they lurked on the furthest reaches of the world of death and gathered their strength, watched, waited, patient. They had no interested in the world of the living, their targets were as ever one another. He realized their existence only once he felt the dwindling of his power and knew then that he had never been hunting them, they were the hunters and he understood at once how he would die.
It would never be one battle, great and terrible. There would never be some great monster that hunted after his world that he would sacrifice himself to protect it. There would never be a singular final battle between him and the Shinigami he vexed. Instead, there would be battles, hundreds and thousands of battles that he fought every day to strike the balance in favor of the Shinigami who struggled to protect a world he would never see again. Then, when the last of his strength failed him, when at least he was deemed a manageable threat from creatures to whom the hunt had become the whole sum of their soul's existence, one would descend upon him and he would die. Perhaps the battles he fought bought the time that the worlds he sought to protect needed to recover so they could protect themselves, perhaps it wouldn't. It didn't matter, it wouldn't change anything.
It was his purpose to fight, to fight a fight with no end until an end found him.
Today was his end. He knew the moment he opened his eyes, found them heavy and difficult to keep open. The way he rose to his feet, limbs sluggish and heavy, the way he continued his way across the desert. His power smoldered, muted and quiet. He felt them gathering around, a gathered horde to serve as the smokescreen to the threat the lurked just on the edge, a beast he could only sense because it let him.
They descended, and one last time he called his blade. One last time he whispered its name. His power burned across the desert filled with death and he filled it one last time with an ocean of their Hollow blood.
And at last, when the swarm had been scattered to the sand as ash and blood the Beast descended upon him and took from him his arm. He knew that one of them would kill him, but not this one.
One last time his power rang out, one last spell of destruction woven by a soul that had wielded destruction for as long as it had known it could. One last flash of light and torturous heat and the desert fell silent. His blade vanished, scattered to the last act of destruction that he would unleash.
His blood gathered about his feet as he sank to his knees and smiled. There would be others soon enough, they would descend upon him and he would not resist, could not. He closed his eyes as his black robes, tattered and ruined gathered about him and thought one last time to the world that he would never see again. Of blue skies, of a quiet little city he once called home, and of the people he had met along the way of his strange journey. There was no destiny for him to achieve, no greater meaning to his life.
Jian wouldn't have changed a thing.
The Shinigami were dying, great numbers had went and gone and even as far from the world as he was he knew this to be so. The beasts knew too, he could feel their excitement, the sense of exhilaration that they might prey on a world bereft of defenders. A plague swept through the Gotei, one he'd been spared off, if not by providence than perhaps due to his fortunately timed exile. He was mortal once upon a time, that was his world beyond the veil, his duty. The Maiden, before she left, had told him that he was like her and that meant he was to the guard the pathways between. He didn't belong on Earth anymore, but that didn't mean he couldn't uphold that charge.
Five years. Maybe plus a day. Maybe more. His vigil took place almost on the day when he realized that he couldn't exist in the world of glass. It was when he realized that if he tried to live among them he'd try to control them. He was their guardian, not their master. He left for a place bereft of life which was perfect for someone whose only method to protect was destruction. Here his power required no checks, no balance, it could rage in all directions, against all things that it found, and it did. He scarred the land, left his mark again and again in a land so vast that none would ever see it. He wielded his power against monsters so vast in number that he could spend an eternity killing innumerable swarms and not even make a dent.
Days past rarely with thought, most times he didn't find a single creature, sometimes a pack of them hardly worth the effort, on the rarest of occasions an army the likes of which would destroy the whole Earth if they'd ever had the inclination and its defenders were absent. Even those too passed with no great effort. It was never one great battle that threatened him, it was the struggle of each day, the uncertainty of battles day in and day out, the absence of rest. His vigils first lesson was that his power was far from limitless. Early on he fought recklessly, wild, he embraced the freedom that his exile had given him and spent his power without concern. He burned bright, a supernova of fury and destruction. He drew upon his well with abandon believing it not to have an end, but it did.
Every day he could feel himself slow, ever slightly. Every day he could feel less of the spark inside him, he felt the energy slip through his fingers with every battle, a little less returning to him each day. He realized that there was an end, that one day his strength would leave him and that the only thing that held it at bay was how carefully he marshaled that use but never would it be enough. He never feared the creatures who gathered together, whether they existed in packs or countless multitudes and armies. Those creatures existed to exist, empty. Hollow.
The creatures that he feared shared company with none, they lurked on the furthest reaches of the world of death and gathered their strength, watched, waited, patient. They had no interested in the world of the living, their targets were as ever one another. He realized their existence only once he felt the dwindling of his power and knew then that he had never been hunting them, they were the hunters and he understood at once how he would die.
It would never be one battle, great and terrible. There would never be some great monster that hunted after his world that he would sacrifice himself to protect it. There would never be a singular final battle between him and the Shinigami he vexed. Instead, there would be battles, hundreds and thousands of battles that he fought every day to strike the balance in favor of the Shinigami who struggled to protect a world he would never see again. Then, when the last of his strength failed him, when at least he was deemed a manageable threat from creatures to whom the hunt had become the whole sum of their soul's existence, one would descend upon him and he would die. Perhaps the battles he fought bought the time that the worlds he sought to protect needed to recover so they could protect themselves, perhaps it wouldn't. It didn't matter, it wouldn't change anything.
It was his purpose to fight, to fight a fight with no end until an end found him.
Today was his end. He knew the moment he opened his eyes, found them heavy and difficult to keep open. The way he rose to his feet, limbs sluggish and heavy, the way he continued his way across the desert. His power smoldered, muted and quiet. He felt them gathering around, a gathered horde to serve as the smokescreen to the threat the lurked just on the edge, a beast he could only sense because it let him.
They descended, and one last time he called his blade. One last time he whispered its name. His power burned across the desert filled with death and he filled it one last time with an ocean of their Hollow blood.
And at last, when the swarm had been scattered to the sand as ash and blood the Beast descended upon him and took from him his arm. He knew that one of them would kill him, but not this one.
One last time his power rang out, one last spell of destruction woven by a soul that had wielded destruction for as long as it had known it could. One last flash of light and torturous heat and the desert fell silent. His blade vanished, scattered to the last act of destruction that he would unleash.
His blood gathered about his feet as he sank to his knees and smiled. There would be others soon enough, they would descend upon him and he would not resist, could not. He closed his eyes as his black robes, tattered and ruined gathered about him and thought one last time to the world that he would never see again. Of blue skies, of a quiet little city he once called home, and of the people he had met along the way of his strange journey. There was no destiny for him to achieve, no greater meaning to his life.
Jian wouldn't have changed a thing.