A Shadow's Solace

“What happens when you strip away all the masks a man wears and you find not a face beneath them but nothing at all?”

[shadowssolace]

A cavalcade of characters in continuously cool and couture clothing.

[shadowssolace]

A live action horror series based on the popular roleplaying game, Ten Candles.

Random, out of nowhere Tumblr post from a guy who routinely browses but never posts... You may or may not have heard of the TTRPG “Ten Candles”. It’s creator posted today on social media that he’s been approached by an indie filmmaker to do a 10 episode show with the Ten Candles setting and themes (an episode for each candle, they write). They’re looking for $30k before April 15th on Kickstarter if you wanna throw them a bone because Ten Candles is fantastic and the creator is a really cool dude, I say from first-hand knowledge since we were both staff at the same LARP together.

[quintos-the-storm]

The many glams.

[shadowssolace]

After today’s Tales from the Shadows we need a sitcom about the Ascians. Azem is the lovable squish that nobody can say no to, Emet is always at odds with him but always gives in when Hythlodaeus, the friend-enabler shows up. Emet: "Azem, we can't just ADOPT that puppy..." Azem: "But Emet, he's so cute..." Emet: "It is the way of things to let it fend for itse--!" Hythlodaeus: "Oh just let Azem have his puppy. Remember that time you had an imaginary friend and you actually Created him despite us telling you it was a dumb idea?" Emet: "...." Hythlo: "It's settled then." A few episodes later Emet is seen in the background caring for the puppy while Azem is away on business.

[shadowssolace]

FFXIV Write 2020 - #9 Lush

There was something about being back in La Noscea that Wemrys had missed for a while. So long he’d spent working in the desert of Ul’dah or the verdant green that was the Shroud that home felt all that much better. This place was his home no matter how much time he spent anywhere else. Something about it made him feel clean and new every time he came here. This time he felt like staying for a while though.

The warrior could sit out by the Grey Fleet for bells just staring out over the horizon to watch the sun rise. Or perhaps he could head up the coast to Raincatcher Gully to relax near a waterfall. Perhaps he might even take in the Bloodshore over at Costa del Sol. Any of these places would be good for training as well, then he could just take a load off at Camp Bronze Lake. His home had so many little things that made it ideal that it made him wonder why he’d never spent too long at it since he was left alone in Ul’dah all those years ago.

It was that thought that sobered him. For all the lush atmosphere that La Noscea had, there were only so many jobs, only so many answers to his own problems that could be found there. Wandering different paths, seeing different places, fighting different things, taking on myriad jobs, succeeding and failing in equal measure...all of it had built the man to what he was today. 

Too easy it would be to just hole up in his room or at the Hidden Pearl or at the Drowning Wench or on the beach in Mist at a particular rock he favored...too easy it would be to sit there and drink all day every day. That was what he was for a long while despite the paths he walked. After years of it he finally realized that perhaps the answers to his questions weren’t at the bottom of a bottle.

What had happened to bring him to this point? He knew the general idea. He knew he wanted to find answers and even with all the comforts his home offered, he knew they wouldn’t give him what he needed to enter the next stage of his life. The question that first came to mind then was...where to start?

[shadowssolace]

FFXIV Write - #8 Clamor

There is a cacophony in my head that refuses to cease.

Voices telling me, pulling me, urging me...or is it just one voice? Or perhaps I simply hear a single one above the clamor of it all. But who does said voice belong to? Is it me? Do I simply hear myself when I work? When I explore new grounds? When I relax? 

Or mayhap it is the voice of another. The woman in the other room? The client from earlier today? A dead man from my past?

It is all of them.

It is none of them.

They all pull me toward what I desire the most. Strength. Power. Knowledge. These are things that I desire...these are things that the voice desires. Are they truly one in the same? 

Damn it, Eirwyn.

[shadowssolace]

FFXIV Write 2020 - #7 Nonagenarian

Have you ever wanted to live beyond the years anyone expected you to? I do not speak of some manner of gods given immortality or some such but I mean something just...longer than the average life expectancy? Until recently, I hadn’t met a person who had managed to reach eighty before coming face to face with death ushering them home. 

It’s a funny thing we don’t think about, really. Not initially anyway. We all want to live long lives but we never really think of how long that actually is. I think that’s part of the reason I got so curious about the Void and its denizens. Who knew how long many of them had been around? Did time flow the same there even? Did any of them really care how much time HAD passed in their blighted lives?

These were the obvious questions, followed quickly by things like “how much could they teach us?” or “how many have lived on our plane of existence without us knowing and for how long?” It’s funny really...now that I have the opportunity to ask one properly I feel it almost improper. I mean granted I do talk a lot and get curious around her, but from the sound of it most details of our world don’t even concern her.

For being practically ageless Thiya is such an ephemeral entity. Perhaps that was just how she decided to live some time ago when she compared her lifespan to anyone else around her outside of the Void. I simply can’t fathom it though. I can’t understand moving through life with no significant connections. Or perhaps I’m misunderstanding something. Perhaps there are people of circumstance to her, but they are so long gone that it is not worth mentioning to someone not of that age. Especially not to someone who is practically a child in her eyes.

Gods that’s a strange way to think about my age. Someone in their early twenties is usually considered an adult in our world. Even if I were to reach ninety, I would still be but the smallest fraction of her life. What gap could I possibly hope to fill in any life when put into such a perspective? It’s almost depressing to think about.

Almost.

If I weren’t so damn interested in knowing more.

[shadowssolace]

FFXIV Write 2020 - #5 Matter of Fact

“Swords and magic are tools. These tools allow us to become something more than just mere flesh and bone, they allow us the ability to do a great deal of things. Defending yourself is one sure thing you can do with these tools, the obvious thing. What else can you do though? A sword can cut, it can be used with flint to light a fire, it can be intimidation, part of a disguise...magic is even more flexible. If you can think of a use for an element then you can likely do it. Your tools are versatile, young Bekram. Your mind is your only limit.”

The words of Master Nasim rung in Bekram’s head as he stared down the massive tortoise. The thing was as large as almost three of him both in length and height, not to mention it was charging him. Luckily Bekram was already prepared, three aetherial blades floating around him and three more encircling the person observing him. 

Observing…

He smirked a bit to himself as he remembered once more that this was all a show. The young Red Mage was interested in helping the elezen behind him with locating what she was looking for and he felt the need to prove his skills. Bekram being who he was, this was just an opportunity to show off.

Planting the tip of his rapier in the ground, Bekram grabbed two of the floating, aetherial blades and ran to meet the beast’s charge. The third blade flew ahead at his mental suggestion and met the creature, halting its charge suddenly and giving Bekram an opening to clamber up its side, cutting a wide gash in its shell with one blade that disappeared upon use. The second blade was plunged into that gash. 

“Now for the flashy part…” He muttered to himself, willing the remaining three blades that surrounded the silver-haired woman to swirl around her in a showy manner before flying forward to all collide with the beast, causing it to rear. Before they could make contact though, Bekram himself was already in motion. The young man reached out to his rapier and “pulled” on an aetherial tether between him and it, only to find himself flying through the air and landing gracefully next to the planted weapon just as the fleché blades impacted. Pulling the rapier from the ground, Bekram used the last of his gathered aether to fire off a lightning aspected spell into the belly of the reared tortoise, causing it to topple over and stop moving.

A breath of relief escaped the lad. It was too much exertion, far too flashy, far too much movement. Master Nasim would have been annoyed with him...but when he heard the elation of even the blind woman behind him reacting to just the “sight” and feel of the aether going on around her from the battle, Bekram found himself grinning once again. 

Tools, Master Nasim had called his weapon and abilities with that matter-of-fact tone of his. Versatile tools not just used for fighting and certainly not meant for showing off...but who said one couldn’t show off a bit to fulfil a purpose? That too was a fact Bekram had come to enjoy.

[shadowssolace]

FFXIV Write 2020 - #4 Clinch

This was it. This was the moment. One last thrust of a blade home and it would be done. His position would be secured. Just this one last test, kill this one person and he could...he could…

The sixteen year old Aras almost caught himself hesitating, but he couldn’t afford to. Not against this target. They were highly skilled, that he’d gotten this close without being spotted was practically a miracle. The would-be assassin stood poised, ready to strike, he just needed to creep in a little closer… “So this is how they decided you would prove yourself to them.” A heavily accented common he knew came from his Hingan target. The voice changed to Hingan as the woman turned her head slightly, “Your form was adequate. I nearly failed to hear you coming. Nearly. That is the difference between success and failure though, Aras. If you can only manage ‘nearly’ perfect then this is not your--”

Aras spoke up cutting her off, “This isn’t the time for lessons, Chizue. You already surmised what I’m here to do…”

His former sensei was silent at that, the Hingan woman finally turning to face him more fully. Her lavender eyes bore into him as if judging his every move even now. Would he be found wanting? Or perhaps she was just sizing up how properly to kill him and leave the city before anyone could find out.

“And thus you will?” She asked once again in the common tongue. “I think you are better than the mistakes you made, that you could have taken me without me ever realizing what had happened. Or perhaps failing that you would have brought me into a clinch and we would have struggled for control until one of us lie dead on the floor. So why have you not?” The young man gripped his chosen dagger tightly, knuckles whitening as he stared at her. She wasn’t wrong...and that frustrated him further. He’d failed at the one job he was given entirely because he’d done the one thing he shouldn’t have: Aras had grown fond of his teacher.

“I see.” Chizue continued, “Your silence speaks volumes...but I’ll not have you fail, Aras.” Without much of another word she drew her own blade and with a swift motion and a sharp drawing of breath she cut her ear clean off. The woman shuddered from the pain that Aras could only imagine and then spoke to him, “Take that w-with you. Tell them you succeeded.”

He couldn’t even speak as he watched her treat herself with some manner of tincture and wrap her own head in bandages to stem the flow of blood. “Do not come looking for me, Aras. Forget I exist. For all intents and purposes I am dead. And...one more thing.”

The woman made her way over to Aras...and flipped her weapon in her hand, jabbing it into his shoulder roughly, deep enough to cause pain that flashed white and red in his vision but not nearly enough to kill him. He drew the weapon down from his shoulder and along his back, slicing a large gash. Had he cried out? The boy didn’t know. 

“That will be enough. They will believe you fought for it.” Her voice came echoing through his pain. She pressed something into his hand. “Take it. If this is the life you choose then stay with it. If it is not...then that is something you must decide.” 

The assassin to be shuddered in pain, trying to reel his mind in from the injury she’d given him. It was necessary wasn’t it…? They would accept him with this. His eyes came up finally as if to ask her the same question over again but the woman was gone by the time he did. When he glanced down at his hand he realized the grisly trophy she’d left him before he limped back to the window he’d come in from. It’d be a difficult path back to his home, but walking the streets wasn’t an option. This too was part of the test. A test he knew now he’d pass.

[shadowssolace]

FFXIV Write 2020 - #3 Muster

Only one life. A person only gets one life. That is something that was plainly obvious to anyone who lived. And yet Kuzhuk had lived many up to this point. Obviously not in a literal sense but there was something to be said about a man who should have died numerous times over to have continued living this long. Not only that but to feel young this long.

The xaela was in his mid forties at this point, but it didn’t seem to slow him down a step. Not anymore than usual anyhow. Most of the time he was able to move and act for hours, probably even days on end without rest. He attributed this to his soulstone, a strength he had come across many years ago at the tail end of his first life. His father had seen to that end...that’s when he ceased being of one family, of one tribe and ended up becoming The Hunter. When the Hunter’s time ran out in Othard, his attention turned West and he became Kuzhuk Anchin. A new persona that wasn’t a combination of the two but rather an entirely new entity altogether, one that was more cunning and conniving, selfish yet pragmatic...a man who saw others as nowhere close to his equal even if he treated them as such to their faces.

This was the third life he had lived and suspected that in his hunt for more strength it would be the last. Once he had conquered the weakness that came after the extended stamina his soulstone gave him, which would often leave the man helpless and exhausted, Kuzhuk would be able to live comfortably as the man in the shadows that he’d become. Knowledge was power and that power would see him to a life that would be...satisfying.

Of course that was before he had his world view challenged. That was before he was told he didn’t need the stone, that he could be whole without it. That he just needed to get past the way the stone changed him, the way it hid away a fourth life that he was fully aware of but believed he had control over. He could be what he wanted without that stone. 

Damn the woman who put it in his head that he might be going about this wrong. Kuzhuk Anchin never doubted himself...so why now was he realizing that perhaps she might be right, that the power he’d coveted all this time was actually the thing controlling him rather than the other way around? Whispers would come and deny this but the more he thought about it the more he realized that perhaps his machinations had never been his own to begin with. He couldn’t muster the willpower to be rid of it though...nor could he find it in him to disbelieve her either.

Where was the answer in all of this? Sleepless nights followed him around like an angry wraith despite the work he needed to accomplish of late. He needed to know if all this time he’d been a damned fool, or if he was simply being one now for listening to the words of someone Kuzhuk had let become too aware of a past life of his. Of a home under the endless blue expanse of the sky and the rolling greens of the grasses of the Azim Steppe. Of a life he sometimes admitted to himself that he missed more than he could have ever known before.

[shadowssolace]

As a note:

I’m going to be consolidating ALL of my FFXIV Write posts on the @shadowssolace blog (i.e. this one) rather than reposting them to @quintos-the-storm for the sheer sake of keeping things simple since the posts will all be about varied characters.

[shadowssolace]

FFXIV Write 2020 - #2 Sway

“It ain’t easy. Nothin’s easy. I mean...sometimes life comes at’cha and yer just nowhere near ready ta deal wit’ it. I don’t like ta brag but that’s basically been how things are fer me. There ain’t a day goes by where I don’t think ‘bout how much has changed over th’ cycles, how many problems’ve presented themselves that can’t be fixed by me swingin’ a sword or a axe or a club or...whate’er else I can get me hands on at it. Hells even as a youngin’ I was left sittin’ ‘round wonderin’ if th’ reports were wrong, if mum an’ da were gonna jus’ show back up an’ take me back ta La Noscea like nothin’ had happened. Merchants at th’ time but I knew they were both plenny capable. Can’t say fer sure why they never showed back up. Buncha bleedin’ Amalj’aa wouldn’t get th’ better o’ either of ‘em.

Heh...did I say that I were braggin’? I mean I didn’t mean ta be a sop. By now ye’ve heard ‘bout me story. Ye’ve heard me talk ‘bout Carteneau. Ye’ve heard me talk about th’ Winds. Now? Now I’m feelin’ like talkin’ ‘bout me. I’m feelin’ like there are things I missed out there tha’ don’t quite make sense no matter how much I try ta piece it tagether after twenny-odd cycles of thinkin’. 

Don’t I got family? I know there’s nobody left on me da’s side. Not anyone who wanted ta associate wit’ ‘im anyway ‘cos o’ his time as a pirate. Nay I don’t mean that...I got Doman blood in me as well after all. While th’ damned Garleans overran the place, it don’t mean that me blood were all spilt in the reckonin’ that followed. Doman families’re old. They’re strong. I’ve heard of many tha’ lasted e’en through the Garlean rule through one means or anuvver. I might only be partly related ta ‘em but...why can’t tha’ mean summat?

It were ne’er jus’ ‘cos mum taught me as a kid tha’ I decided ta be so interested in th’ language, th’ culture, an’ all tha’. It were ‘cos o’ what she didn’t teach me tha’ tha’s held sway o’er me fer ages. Tha’ me apartment’s in Shirogane. Tha’ I got so bleedin’ interested in learnin’ th’ katana e’en when I already knew a buncha other forms o’ fightin’. I feel like there’s summat more ta learn. Summat I ain’t found yet…

Hells...I’m talkin’ yer ear off. Sorry, mate. Why don’t ye tell me ‘bout yerself instead…?”

-Wemrys Quintos, overheard drinking one evening

[shadowssolace]

FFXIV Write 2020 - #1 Crux

“How did you even come across a magick like that?”

Thiya’s question still echoed in Nheu’a’s mind days later. The more he wracked his mind it didn’t come to him how the blood ruby-eyed Keeper had even come across the power. Blackfire...a strange ability to be sure. Created by the voidmages to combat Voidsent who turned against them. Usually it was something that when not contained it ran wild and burned everything around it which was why he usually applied it to his sword instead of throwing it. While made to fight Voidsent it was no less dangerous to other creatures...in fact it might even be considered moreso, not that Nheu’a ever had tested the magick on anyone from his plane of existence. 

Before being able to use it he’d only heard of it in tomes of knowledge, though. Over 22 summers of life, the Keeper had never once been able to properly find a way of conjuring such a spell in any tome or scroll he’d come across. Yet here the knowledge was in his head all along as if he’d been able to pull it out of thin air. 

The exact first time he’d been able to use it was easy enough to recall. His testing and experimentation of his own abilities to prepare for his search for the archdemon that was the center of his ire had brought him to a place rife with Voidsent, the tower of Amdapor Keep. Nheu’a was a capable enough swordsman to have been able to make it through most of the weaker enemies he encountered there, but it was a larger Voidsent that was to nearly become his demise. The thing was massive, jet black, walking on four legs with an almost lizard-like appearance except that its maw was lined with teeth sharper than any lizard or land-gator he’d ever seen. And its eyes, gods its eyes...they weren’t just piercing in a metaphorical sense, they had some kind of power behind them that would have killed him with just a look if he fixated on them for too long.

The Keeper was outmatched and the thing was too fast for him to run from. It was just when he thought death was upon him that he had a flash of inspiration. An image of...something or someone incanting a particular way, a wash of fire colored all black. When he came out of the vision the Blackflame was upon his blade and he thrust it home into the beast that was attacking him. The Void creature was consumed by the flames almost instantly, giving screeching hiss of despair before falling limply to the ground.

Nheu’a could remember that image clearly at this point but no details about where he’d seen anything in that memory before in his life. He thought maybe one day it might come back to him...but instead he simply had nothing more than the ability on hand and a vague memory of a memory.

It didn’t matter. The crux of it was that he knew a power that was bound to help him and his voidsent companion complete a task that many might call reckless. After all...the mutual hatred of a particular archdemon wasn’t quite enough on its own to equate to said archdemon in power he and Thiya would need every advantage they could get.

[whitherwanderer]

[veils-and-hearts]

A social butterfly.

[shadowssolace]

Home and all the memories that come with it.

Bekram Taloth, Red Mage of Ala Ghiri

[shadowssolace]

This is not a drill. SquareEnix has confirmed NieR Replicant, the original NieR game, is getting a full remake (or “version up” as Yoko Taro is calling it) and it’s coming to PS4, XBOne, and PC via Steam.