So here’s the snippet I said I might maybe throw out there
EmetWol
Fem!WoL, Metalcrafter!WoL, Unnamed WoL
A/N: Smut later. Takes place during 5.x (ShB) but is best read if you’ve played through 6.x (EW) as there are spoilers, and the whole premise kind of bases off info gained in 6.x. This is really all thanks to me doing my Crystalline Mean quests late af to level my 80+ crafters. Enjoy regardless
I had some art idea with Ahra and how she changed in the story. Of course I started with the Shadowbringers time (because why not), but I want to do the same concept with ARR, HW and SB too.
I was so slowly while I working on this art but I love it.
I should be doing my normal Resurrection Story, but no, this one bit my butt, and now I have two of them to write.
This one, however, is meant for a neutral fem!WoL, since I’m tempted to post on AO3 once I actually have more of the plot written.
For now enjoy. (Also, sidenote, the beginning is the same as the Resurrection Story’s since, I like it too much.)
All Haurchefant knows in that moment is there is a spear. His dearest is the target. She, however, focuses only on the airship ahead of them and not the dark-armored assassin behind.
He throws up his shield in time, but something feels wrong. Not just the force of the javelin. The noise sounds like… thunder. Light spreads from the other side. And the weapon does not drop at the Ishgardian steel it presses against. It drills through like nothing he knows before.
“Haurché!” the Warrior shouts. “Step aside! I can—”
Her words stop as the javelin breaks through his shield and digs into his chest. And vanishes. His shield drops from his hand, He staggers backwards. Someone catches him. Not his love. She sits in front of him, his hand in hers.
“You—you are unharmed,” he says. Each word feels like an arrow as he struggles to breath. “I could not bear the thought of—”
She interrupts him. “Don’t worry, I have other friends that came with me. Helped face the Heavens’ Ward damn the charges. Some have some skill with healing. I’m sure they’re just a few steps away.” They both know she is in denial. Her eyes well up with tears and her words choke on a hopeless frown.
“Don’t look at me so. A smile better suits a hero.”
A dying wish. One last smile from his love is all he needs.
She smiles through tears. Still insists her friends are close enough to save him. He can’t keep his eyes open any longer. His hand is too heavy to keep lifted, even with his dearest’s around it.
He has flashes of her in his mind. The Sea of Clouds. That primal they saw when his brother was kidnapped by Vanu. The Warrior of Light calls forth a weapon as the knights of the Heavens’ Ward take something. She threatens Zephirin over what the man did to him. Was he that assassin? How did she know? Zephirin smirks and bows to her.
Shiva glittering in an orange sky as she takes fire from an imperial ship. While his love stands on the edge of an airship, helpless to stop the fight. Save a primal from the onslaught.
Thirteen elezen in highly decorated armor of old Ishgardian styles surround her as she fights off their attack and slays the leader, cutting a path through his murderer to get there. Her weapons change effortlessly between a all he has seen her with before as needed.
And finally, she stands at Providence Point with Tataru and Alphinaud. A gravestone with his name on it, and his shield by its side. A fresh bouquet of Nymeia Lilies lay in front of it.
“From here,” Tataru says. “He can watch over all of Ishgard.”
As much as he wants to still protect his home, protect his love, he wants it to not be as some Saint watching from afar. He wants to be part of it.
The world fades for a second.
“You refuse to rest,” a voice says. Soothing, sweet, but strong. The kind of voice he used to imagine the Fury, Halone herself, would have, before he met his love. “You have deserved this place, why do you choose to run back to the Source?”
“She needs me,” he says. “Every time I see her, she gives a strong face, but she’s hurt.” Is this a place he has been before? A conversation he had before. It feels familiar.
A direction he needs to run.
The voice puts a hand on his shoulder. Or something like it. Is this Halone? Or maybe someone greater. “She mourns. Your death is fresh. She will grow past it one day. And one day, I shall claim her too, and you shall be reunited.”
It’s not good enough for him. His fists ball together. “How long must I wait for her? A month? A year? An epoch? She won’t stop mourning me. I need to be there.”
“Your death was most unusual. Ascians were behind it. A few men behind the man, but it still served their purpose.” There’s a tremble in their voice. “You will continue this fight to return to the Source as long as my champion draws breath? You will likely succeed eventually, but perhaps if I should let you—”
He feels something change around him. His head feels happier.
“A test must be required, Knight. Of your will, among others’. You have thirteen days to prove yourself. For those thirteen days, you must not let any see your face except yourself, and no one you knew before can hear your voice. I shall let you have safety in a single room for sleeping and bathing.”
He smiles. Not that any know under what must be a new helmet. It was almost too easy. He knew an inn his brothers didn’t visit, and had good enough food. If he stayed there, things would be fine, even with its proximity to the Congregation of Our Knights Most Heavenly.
“There are no catches in those terms?” he asks. “No conditions I must live by? Should I choose to spend those days in safety, speaking as little as possible to others?”
“You must stay in Ishgard. And live up to the words that sealed your death.”
He remembers what he said to his father when the man tried to talk him down. A knight’s calling is to serve, to protect. Exactly what he had done in the end, which led to a sacrifice.
Even if he keeps a shield, it would lack a crest. Some would see him as a dark knight, of sorts.
He can live with that. A thirteen day trial of his beliefs, and he’d keep the body he needs.
“Do you accept my rules as I have given them to you?”
“I shall be faceless to all but myself, and mute to those I loved before. My path is bound by the walls of Foundation, and I must serve others to the best of my ability. These are terms I can abide by.”
“Very well. Return to the Source, my child, and I pray for your success. My champion will likely need you in her coming trials.”
