Eighty
Talos
Has Completed: Three Quests
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Twisted crystal corridors, designed to mislead the mind, and lose the unwary were no match for your well-trained instincts. Your feet following the trail you felt like you had tread a thousand times before. Each heavy footfall accompanied by the thunderous return of a memory from long ago.
Here you had stood on guard along with Magnamon, passing to him the teaching of knighthood during one of the rare breaks from the chaotic infighting that periodically swept through the Digital World.
Here was where you had walked side-by-side with Omnimon, just after making it to the mega level. Seeking his advice on how best to control your power.
This way was the one you had walked when you first arrived in the city; before you were even truly a knight. Merely a Growlmon who showed promise. How long ago had that been? Hundreds of years? Certainly. Yet sometimes it seemed only a touch away, that first moment when your vision had cleared, and you had seen the city, and known in your heart that this was what you had wanted to be. A knight.
There were bad memories too.
That path was the one you had taken to your fateful battle with GallantmonX, though you could not say that what you had learned during that battle was wrong, it had certainly been unpleasant; and the years that followed even more so. Each of these experiences had changed you, altered the man you were, and the man that you would be. At first, by small increments and then by larger ones. As much as you had come to understand the corruption that this place represented, you found that even now you could not hate it. It was comforting, like returning home after a long time away. The crystal walls and glitterings floors – intending to disturb, unnerve and confuse – were like the embrace of old friends to you.
Dynasmon didn't speak much, too caught up in his own chaotic thoughts as he padded along in your wake. Content to let you choose what you felt was the best route. You selected a long, looping one. Intending to take you around most of where the fighting would be. Hopefully, it would let you slip past whatever guards remained.
Yet even for your careful choice, you felt the floors and walls rattling with traded blows. The distant echo of explosions faintly reaching your ears. You scented blood, and fire; your old instincts coming slowly to life. You felt almost naked without the comforting presence of UlForceVeedramon. He'd been a source of confidence, even in his silence. A powerful ally, as he had proven during the fight with CurseDevimon. Now it was you and Dynasmon, and part of you wondered at he speed with which you jumped back to considering these two your allies.
DoruGreymon had warned you that you were falling back into the old ways, maybe there was more truth to it than you had thought. You had to admit, you felt better now than you ever had before. Stronger. As though a great weight had been removed. Was this really all that it took to undo how many years of wanderings? Of bitterness?
It's not the same. You said to yourself. Last time, I was blind to the faults we had. I refused to see the truth. Now, I can see that truth, but I choose to fight with former allies who I know are worthy. It doesn't mean that I am going back to being one of them.
But what did that leave you then? You were uncomfortably aware that you had never been happier as a Crimson Knight or as a rogue than you were right now. You had tried to cast off the past, and become someone new, but it seemed the past was not so easy to be rid of. You had killed, the blood of innocent had flowed across the edge of your lance. You had destroyed, a mindless soldier loyal to a mad god. What justice was there in this world if you merely walked away from that? Just because you wanted to do good, it didn't erase all the harm that you had already done. You would never be able to make up for it, would you?
"Of course not. But it doesn't mean that I can't try."
"Gallantmon, did you say something?"
"No, Dynasmon. It's fine. I'm just trying to remember the way to the throne room."
A period of silence followed, and then Dynasmon spoke. Almost hesitantly.
"We're almost there, aren't we?"
"Yeah."
"We're going to have to fight Yggdrasial, aren't we?"
A longer pause.
"...Yeah..."
"We're going to die."
"Probably."
"It's funny, you know. I was confident when I went into the Dark Ocean because I was hiding from myself. I told myself that it would just be like any other battle, but it's because on some level I didn't want to think of it. I didn't want to think that I'd been betrayed like that, that my Lord could do something like that. I covered it with rage, and anger, but... I never really thought this far ahead. Yggdrasial is the God of the Digital World. His powers are beyond ours. What happens if we're not strong enough?"
"We die." You said. "But we die fighting. We're not going to sit down quietly and let him destroy the world again. And the two of us are megas. Let's not pretend we're totally helpless here. We can win. I'm sure of it."
"Yeah." Dynasmon said. "And even if we don't, I'm not sure that it wouldn't be a good thing anyway. Everything I did before that Devimon shattered my façade, before I let myself see what I was doing...Maybe it's better if both we and Yggdrasial died in this fight."
"That's possible." You replied. The two of you had come to a long corridor now, the walls were lined with murals. The history of the Royal Knights, ancient heroes looking down at you as you walked from past to future. "But only if you don't think that we can make up for what we've done."
"Make up for it?" Dynasmon snorted. "I've lived a life of combat and pride. I never believed in higher justice, or in redemption. If someone else had come along with this same blood on their hands, I would have turned on them in an instant. So how can I really believe that I can come back from something like this? All my life, I thought I was a hero. Turns out, I was worse than the monsters I fought."
"We all were." You said. "But we can't let that hold us back right now. The Digital World is in danger; a danger that we ourselves helped to create. If there is self-blame to come, it should come afterwards. At the very least, we're needed now."
"Needed?" He said. "We caused it. If we hadn't been here..."
"Yggdrasial would have found some other way to set this up." You said firmly. "Let's not go looking for more blame when there is plenty enough of it already. Win this fight, and then you can decide if you're a hero or a monster."
"That is already a forgone conclusion, I'm afraid."
"You might surprise yourself. I did. I spent years wandering the world, blaming myself, and piling guilt upon guilt. I nearly drove myself insane, and I very nearly drove myself into two pieces before I realised that the past is gone and you can't fix it. No matter how much you want to, or how much you'd give to be able to go back and do things again. A man could get lost in that hope; swept up in the what ifs, in the could haves. You can't let that happen, or you'll deteriorate as I did. Just keep moving, that's all I can say. Keep moving, keep fighting and one day you'll be able to look yourself in the eye again."
"Gallantmon, I hear something."
"Yeah, I hear it too." You had paused now, holding your hand up for silence as you tried to track the source of the sound "It's probably just fighting on the outside, but I-"
The wall shattered with a sudden shriek of breaking crystal, force enough to throw you from your feet, and slam you into the far side of the corridor. Gloriously painted murals flew in slivers past your body, as you glanced up to see a hole into one of the many corridors which dotted the palace. A fountain of crystal, and well kept grass greeted your gaze for a moment before a form smashed into the wall at your side. A groan escaping its lips as it slid to the ground.
"Gankoomon!" Dynasmon snarled, moving to your fallen alley's side. It was, as he said, Gankoomon. The wandering knight. His white and black stripped cloak hanging around him, only barely disguising the cuts and scraps of the fight. A nimbus of pale light fluttered around him, but seemed unable to coalesce into his partner, Hinukamuy. He groaned, his eyes forcing themselves open.
"Gallantmon? What're you-Down!"
He leapt forward, catching you in a hold, and pulling you away from the spot just as titanic blow shattered the side of the corridor, and a massive form loomed above you. Its shadow cast across the broken history of the Royal Knights.
You'd never met one of these before.
It was a creature like the others, like DexDoruGreymon, but it seemed almost half-formed. And not as though it had been severely wounded, and lost data but actually as though it had never finished shaping its body. Its head was covered by a purple helmet of digizoid, from its back, there extended many crimson wings. It's arms and legs... it didn't have anything there. They were just wire-frames, digital constructs marking out where limbs should have been. It had hands though, or claws, really. Talons each one larger than you were long. It moved on four ''legs'' though again, the legs didn't actually exist as such. There was just a vague shape of wires and mesh where they should have been.
And then there was the sense. The heavy-set feeling which seemed to roll like a fog before the creature. Megadramon had been like this in a manner to do with rage; but if this was an incarnation of anything it was the void. Even standing near to it brought an aching feeling to your gut. A sense of emptiness, and of hunger. It was this more than anything that linked the monster to the Dex-Digimon you had fought already. But this one was a hundred, no, a thousand times as intense.
And it was silent. It didn't shriek like the others. It didn't even make a sound as its impossible limbs trailed across the ruined crystal of the walls. Like purpose itself, it lowered its head slowly as it caught sight of you, where Gankoomon had pushed you in the rush.
You recognised it with a stab of dread. The creature, the one you had fought before. And in that instant, you saw it recognise you as well.
It pulled back, its massive bulk obscuring the sunlight from the garden, you drew yourself up to your feet. Manifesting Gram in your hand, the taste of blood in your mouth as you looked up at the creature, the thing which should not even have existed. You'd killed it, felt your blade sink into its flesh, burned it beyond the point of return.
And yet, here it stood.
"RAARGHH!" A dragon-like head was shoved through a crack in the wall, massive fangs locking and unlocked as it pushed, sending shivers of shattering crystal raining down upon you.
Dynasmon struck it hard on the head, and it went limp with a resounding crack. Seconds passed, and its body began to fade away. You turned your focus back on the monster, but it was withdrawing. Pulling back into the garden as though its intended prey meant nothing to it now.
You remembered that gaze, that locking of eyes, and the feeling of recognition.
"Gallantmon, what're you-"
You ignored him, stepping forward, and wrapped your hand around the cracked lip of the caved-in wall. Your thoughts consumed by the creature you had seen, and the power that you had felt. You pulled yourself forward, dropping into the garden from the walkway above which the corridor ran.
The swarm outside attacked, A dozen or so DexDoruGreymon rushing to tear you limb from limb. You met them without a pause, cleaving deep into their ranks with your speed and power. Killing with Gram was second nature to you by now, and so you fought well and fiercely. The creatures had little hope of victory, for a dozen of them was not enough to overwhelm you. There must have been many more at first, but Gankoomon had not been without his skills.
But as you fought, tumbling and twisting through the air, parrying teeth, and evading kicks, flames and tails, you saw the creature. The massive one just watching, patently. Every second it didn't attack with its kin reduced their number, yet it did not seem moved to help them. It watched as you killed again and again, until the last dragon fell before you, shuddering for a moment before feeling the cold grip of Anubismon's hands.
Only then did it move. It took a titanic step forwards, the ground shaking beneath its bulk. A wave of hunger washed over you, it raised one massive foot, and stamped down hard.
Before you even knew what had happened, the floor began to give way, corridors networked below the garden collapsing in on themselves. You leapt back, moving for safety. The creature didn't, it let itself fall.
You rushed to the edge of the new hole just in time to see its form obscured in shadow.
"Gallantmon." Dynasmon was coming up from behind you now. "What was that?"
"I don't know." You said, still gazing at the hole. Looking for signs of movement, any notice of an attack. "But I faced it before. It was the creature I fought back in the forest. I thought I'd killed it, but it seems intent on hunting me now more than ever." You took a step forward.
"You can't go after it." Dynasmon said swiftly, seeing your intent. "You're needed here. To help us face Yggdrasial. Our chances are low enough without you."
"It is the leader." You said. "You watched how it commanded the others to attack. If we take it out, we might break the attack."
"We don't know it's the leader. It could only be a high level creature amongst them, one of many. Or maybe they only listened to it because it was nearby. You've seen these creatures, they don't fight with tactics, they don't need leaders. If you go after it, even if you kill it, it'll be utterly useless if we don't complete our mission. We have to keep going."
"It's up to something." You said through gritted teeth. "It could have attacked and it didn't! It baited me! Wants me to follow it!"
"And before the Dark Ocean, I would have agreed that you should!" Dynasmon snarled. "But my eyes were opened, and now yours should do the same! If it's baiting you, don't fall for it, idiot!"
The word ''idiot'' snapped into place like a blow, the rush of anger enough to break the hold the creature had over you. He was right, you knew. One creature like this couldn't possibly cause more harm than Yggdrasial had already done.
But it had recognised you, and it had baited you. Wanted you to follow it. Those were not the actions of mindless hunger. There was hunger, yes. But directed, channeled and controlled.
What could a monster like that do if let loose in the fortress of the Royal Knights?
What do?
[]Hunt it down. Take Dynasmon, and Gankoomon if he isn't too badly hurt. You won't tolerate such a beast surviving. Not while you don't know what it is up to.
[]Take Dynasmon and Gankoomon to Yggdrasial, if the latter will come. Three Royal Knights is better than two, and you can explain to him on the way. Later, if there is a later, you can hunt the beast.
[]You and Dynasmon can go to Yggdrasial, you're not sure if Gankoomon will help or hinder you, should he learn of your true intent, but there is something you can trust him to do. Send him back for Veedramon.
[]Other?
Here you had stood on guard along with Magnamon, passing to him the teaching of knighthood during one of the rare breaks from the chaotic infighting that periodically swept through the Digital World.
Here was where you had walked side-by-side with Omnimon, just after making it to the mega level. Seeking his advice on how best to control your power.
This way was the one you had walked when you first arrived in the city; before you were even truly a knight. Merely a Growlmon who showed promise. How long ago had that been? Hundreds of years? Certainly. Yet sometimes it seemed only a touch away, that first moment when your vision had cleared, and you had seen the city, and known in your heart that this was what you had wanted to be. A knight.
There were bad memories too.
That path was the one you had taken to your fateful battle with GallantmonX, though you could not say that what you had learned during that battle was wrong, it had certainly been unpleasant; and the years that followed even more so. Each of these experiences had changed you, altered the man you were, and the man that you would be. At first, by small increments and then by larger ones. As much as you had come to understand the corruption that this place represented, you found that even now you could not hate it. It was comforting, like returning home after a long time away. The crystal walls and glitterings floors – intending to disturb, unnerve and confuse – were like the embrace of old friends to you.
Dynasmon didn't speak much, too caught up in his own chaotic thoughts as he padded along in your wake. Content to let you choose what you felt was the best route. You selected a long, looping one. Intending to take you around most of where the fighting would be. Hopefully, it would let you slip past whatever guards remained.
Yet even for your careful choice, you felt the floors and walls rattling with traded blows. The distant echo of explosions faintly reaching your ears. You scented blood, and fire; your old instincts coming slowly to life. You felt almost naked without the comforting presence of UlForceVeedramon. He'd been a source of confidence, even in his silence. A powerful ally, as he had proven during the fight with CurseDevimon. Now it was you and Dynasmon, and part of you wondered at he speed with which you jumped back to considering these two your allies.
DoruGreymon had warned you that you were falling back into the old ways, maybe there was more truth to it than you had thought. You had to admit, you felt better now than you ever had before. Stronger. As though a great weight had been removed. Was this really all that it took to undo how many years of wanderings? Of bitterness?
It's not the same. You said to yourself. Last time, I was blind to the faults we had. I refused to see the truth. Now, I can see that truth, but I choose to fight with former allies who I know are worthy. It doesn't mean that I am going back to being one of them.
But what did that leave you then? You were uncomfortably aware that you had never been happier as a Crimson Knight or as a rogue than you were right now. You had tried to cast off the past, and become someone new, but it seemed the past was not so easy to be rid of. You had killed, the blood of innocent had flowed across the edge of your lance. You had destroyed, a mindless soldier loyal to a mad god. What justice was there in this world if you merely walked away from that? Just because you wanted to do good, it didn't erase all the harm that you had already done. You would never be able to make up for it, would you?
"Of course not. But it doesn't mean that I can't try."
"Gallantmon, did you say something?"
"No, Dynasmon. It's fine. I'm just trying to remember the way to the throne room."
A period of silence followed, and then Dynasmon spoke. Almost hesitantly.
"We're almost there, aren't we?"
"Yeah."
"We're going to have to fight Yggdrasial, aren't we?"
A longer pause.
"...Yeah..."
"We're going to die."
"Probably."
"It's funny, you know. I was confident when I went into the Dark Ocean because I was hiding from myself. I told myself that it would just be like any other battle, but it's because on some level I didn't want to think of it. I didn't want to think that I'd been betrayed like that, that my Lord could do something like that. I covered it with rage, and anger, but... I never really thought this far ahead. Yggdrasial is the God of the Digital World. His powers are beyond ours. What happens if we're not strong enough?"
"We die." You said. "But we die fighting. We're not going to sit down quietly and let him destroy the world again. And the two of us are megas. Let's not pretend we're totally helpless here. We can win. I'm sure of it."
"Yeah." Dynasmon said. "And even if we don't, I'm not sure that it wouldn't be a good thing anyway. Everything I did before that Devimon shattered my façade, before I let myself see what I was doing...Maybe it's better if both we and Yggdrasial died in this fight."
"That's possible." You replied. The two of you had come to a long corridor now, the walls were lined with murals. The history of the Royal Knights, ancient heroes looking down at you as you walked from past to future. "But only if you don't think that we can make up for what we've done."
"Make up for it?" Dynasmon snorted. "I've lived a life of combat and pride. I never believed in higher justice, or in redemption. If someone else had come along with this same blood on their hands, I would have turned on them in an instant. So how can I really believe that I can come back from something like this? All my life, I thought I was a hero. Turns out, I was worse than the monsters I fought."
"We all were." You said. "But we can't let that hold us back right now. The Digital World is in danger; a danger that we ourselves helped to create. If there is self-blame to come, it should come afterwards. At the very least, we're needed now."
"Needed?" He said. "We caused it. If we hadn't been here..."
"Yggdrasial would have found some other way to set this up." You said firmly. "Let's not go looking for more blame when there is plenty enough of it already. Win this fight, and then you can decide if you're a hero or a monster."
"That is already a forgone conclusion, I'm afraid."
"You might surprise yourself. I did. I spent years wandering the world, blaming myself, and piling guilt upon guilt. I nearly drove myself insane, and I very nearly drove myself into two pieces before I realised that the past is gone and you can't fix it. No matter how much you want to, or how much you'd give to be able to go back and do things again. A man could get lost in that hope; swept up in the what ifs, in the could haves. You can't let that happen, or you'll deteriorate as I did. Just keep moving, that's all I can say. Keep moving, keep fighting and one day you'll be able to look yourself in the eye again."
"Gallantmon, I hear something."
"Yeah, I hear it too." You had paused now, holding your hand up for silence as you tried to track the source of the sound "It's probably just fighting on the outside, but I-"
The wall shattered with a sudden shriek of breaking crystal, force enough to throw you from your feet, and slam you into the far side of the corridor. Gloriously painted murals flew in slivers past your body, as you glanced up to see a hole into one of the many corridors which dotted the palace. A fountain of crystal, and well kept grass greeted your gaze for a moment before a form smashed into the wall at your side. A groan escaping its lips as it slid to the ground.
"Gankoomon!" Dynasmon snarled, moving to your fallen alley's side. It was, as he said, Gankoomon. The wandering knight. His white and black stripped cloak hanging around him, only barely disguising the cuts and scraps of the fight. A nimbus of pale light fluttered around him, but seemed unable to coalesce into his partner, Hinukamuy. He groaned, his eyes forcing themselves open.
"Gallantmon? What're you-Down!"
He leapt forward, catching you in a hold, and pulling you away from the spot just as titanic blow shattered the side of the corridor, and a massive form loomed above you. Its shadow cast across the broken history of the Royal Knights.
You'd never met one of these before.
It was a creature like the others, like DexDoruGreymon, but it seemed almost half-formed. And not as though it had been severely wounded, and lost data but actually as though it had never finished shaping its body. Its head was covered by a purple helmet of digizoid, from its back, there extended many crimson wings. It's arms and legs... it didn't have anything there. They were just wire-frames, digital constructs marking out where limbs should have been. It had hands though, or claws, really. Talons each one larger than you were long. It moved on four ''legs'' though again, the legs didn't actually exist as such. There was just a vague shape of wires and mesh where they should have been.
And then there was the sense. The heavy-set feeling which seemed to roll like a fog before the creature. Megadramon had been like this in a manner to do with rage; but if this was an incarnation of anything it was the void. Even standing near to it brought an aching feeling to your gut. A sense of emptiness, and of hunger. It was this more than anything that linked the monster to the Dex-Digimon you had fought already. But this one was a hundred, no, a thousand times as intense.
And it was silent. It didn't shriek like the others. It didn't even make a sound as its impossible limbs trailed across the ruined crystal of the walls. Like purpose itself, it lowered its head slowly as it caught sight of you, where Gankoomon had pushed you in the rush.
You recognised it with a stab of dread. The creature, the one you had fought before. And in that instant, you saw it recognise you as well.
It pulled back, its massive bulk obscuring the sunlight from the garden, you drew yourself up to your feet. Manifesting Gram in your hand, the taste of blood in your mouth as you looked up at the creature, the thing which should not even have existed. You'd killed it, felt your blade sink into its flesh, burned it beyond the point of return.
And yet, here it stood.
"RAARGHH!" A dragon-like head was shoved through a crack in the wall, massive fangs locking and unlocked as it pushed, sending shivers of shattering crystal raining down upon you.
Dynasmon struck it hard on the head, and it went limp with a resounding crack. Seconds passed, and its body began to fade away. You turned your focus back on the monster, but it was withdrawing. Pulling back into the garden as though its intended prey meant nothing to it now.
You remembered that gaze, that locking of eyes, and the feeling of recognition.
"Gallantmon, what're you-"
You ignored him, stepping forward, and wrapped your hand around the cracked lip of the caved-in wall. Your thoughts consumed by the creature you had seen, and the power that you had felt. You pulled yourself forward, dropping into the garden from the walkway above which the corridor ran.
The swarm outside attacked, A dozen or so DexDoruGreymon rushing to tear you limb from limb. You met them without a pause, cleaving deep into their ranks with your speed and power. Killing with Gram was second nature to you by now, and so you fought well and fiercely. The creatures had little hope of victory, for a dozen of them was not enough to overwhelm you. There must have been many more at first, but Gankoomon had not been without his skills.
But as you fought, tumbling and twisting through the air, parrying teeth, and evading kicks, flames and tails, you saw the creature. The massive one just watching, patently. Every second it didn't attack with its kin reduced their number, yet it did not seem moved to help them. It watched as you killed again and again, until the last dragon fell before you, shuddering for a moment before feeling the cold grip of Anubismon's hands.
Only then did it move. It took a titanic step forwards, the ground shaking beneath its bulk. A wave of hunger washed over you, it raised one massive foot, and stamped down hard.
Before you even knew what had happened, the floor began to give way, corridors networked below the garden collapsing in on themselves. You leapt back, moving for safety. The creature didn't, it let itself fall.
You rushed to the edge of the new hole just in time to see its form obscured in shadow.
"Gallantmon." Dynasmon was coming up from behind you now. "What was that?"
"I don't know." You said, still gazing at the hole. Looking for signs of movement, any notice of an attack. "But I faced it before. It was the creature I fought back in the forest. I thought I'd killed it, but it seems intent on hunting me now more than ever." You took a step forward.
"You can't go after it." Dynasmon said swiftly, seeing your intent. "You're needed here. To help us face Yggdrasial. Our chances are low enough without you."
"It is the leader." You said. "You watched how it commanded the others to attack. If we take it out, we might break the attack."
"We don't know it's the leader. It could only be a high level creature amongst them, one of many. Or maybe they only listened to it because it was nearby. You've seen these creatures, they don't fight with tactics, they don't need leaders. If you go after it, even if you kill it, it'll be utterly useless if we don't complete our mission. We have to keep going."
"It's up to something." You said through gritted teeth. "It could have attacked and it didn't! It baited me! Wants me to follow it!"
"And before the Dark Ocean, I would have agreed that you should!" Dynasmon snarled. "But my eyes were opened, and now yours should do the same! If it's baiting you, don't fall for it, idiot!"
The word ''idiot'' snapped into place like a blow, the rush of anger enough to break the hold the creature had over you. He was right, you knew. One creature like this couldn't possibly cause more harm than Yggdrasial had already done.
But it had recognised you, and it had baited you. Wanted you to follow it. Those were not the actions of mindless hunger. There was hunger, yes. But directed, channeled and controlled.
What could a monster like that do if let loose in the fortress of the Royal Knights?
What do?
[]Hunt it down. Take Dynasmon, and Gankoomon if he isn't too badly hurt. You won't tolerate such a beast surviving. Not while you don't know what it is up to.
[]Take Dynasmon and Gankoomon to Yggdrasial, if the latter will come. Three Royal Knights is better than two, and you can explain to him on the way. Later, if there is a later, you can hunt the beast.
[]You and Dynasmon can go to Yggdrasial, you're not sure if Gankoomon will help or hinder you, should he learn of your true intent, but there is something you can trust him to do. Send him back for Veedramon.
[]Other?
