#spellbladerogier

[mintleflower]

Sorcery enthusiast, enjoyer even

[beholdingthedead]

Sulk — d / rogier oneshot

tw / cw: rotting, death, mental illness, body horror

Perhaps the thorns had become enchanted with him long before he stood, aloof, mesmerized by the visage of the crass, sickly mockery of the spore princeling. He can still recant it, the memory as fresh as the sores upon his withering, corroding skin; the memory, the terror of his graceless eyes laying siege to the inflated corpse. The brewing stench of death, the scent of pure decay, feverish and captivating, alluring in its neutral, abject horror. He remembers, so dearly, pulling his gloves off, perhaps in a state of enlightened delusion, and caressing the leather-bound surface of the beast. Oh, how his flesh crooned at the feel of the canvas, lethargic skin, flies buzzing within him in anticipation. His eyes had been filled with a beautiful omen, horror blooming into a graphic adoration as he had witnessed his own body (how could it be?) be impaled by branches, a garden of blood brooding upon his bosom, dripping down, past his quivering feet, which, dangled cryptically beneath him. He hadn’t the time to scream. Perhaps, he would’ve if the thorns had not nestled themselves so deeply, becoming woven into his very being, finding themselves home in him, from his diaphragm to his liver, all of it became a shelter for the scared, little branches in his body. Oh, how wonderful it had been. Yes, he was no stranger to death; as it always went, all Tarnished had and will die. It was an overarching destiny; comforting in its cyclical malice— something about dying, enveloped in a warm death was so much more, however. In those special moments, he had felt superimposed, thrust through his expansive mind into a static state of staunch hysteria. For once, perhaps, he had felt a harrowing ecstasy. Important. Beloved. Dead. What an intoxicating dizzy it had been. If one were to peer into his mind to grasp at such heretical thoughts perhaps they might’ve been afraid; but he was not entranced by such a feeling (fear was a notion for those who are alive. He could not stand the grim association). When had the thorns nestled within him, he wonders, idly. He used to fear. Used to scream and cry and rally against this world. Death, he recants, was once a blasphemous horror to not dance with. What was it that arrogant, brooding boy had said? He could not recall past the fog of beloved nothing that has descended upon his crescendoing, frivolous mind. Likely, he, that arrogant, brooding boy, had warned him, trying to harrow him away from the luscious state of abyss— of true death. It makes him smile, wistful and a bit cruel, at the thought of that boy shepherding him from his perfect end. He probably thought he was strong, he found himself thinking, stronger than anyone (stronger than us, stronger than me). Strong, was he? He finds himself chuckling boyishly at such a whimsical, arrogant thought. Strength was determined by bravery. That arrogant, brooding boy was anything but brave. Hiding behind the Order, behind his armour, behind him, turning away from death, disgusted. How piteous, indeed. Death shall bloom, regardless of the beauty of life and there is little reason to fear it. To fear death is to cower and cowards are weak. Isn’t that right, he whispered, conspiringly, to his legs, covered in darkened brambles of decay. Long since has he lost feeling in such strong, brave legs; now, they sat, paling from disuse and dimming from death. He was rotting, good and well. The thought makes him shudder with a brewing, daft nausea. How deep that inquisitive curse scoured his body, infecting his graceless form with pure, heavy death. He lets out a caustic, rumbling breath, a maelstrom of dreary rot intermingling salaciously with the oxygen amidst his lungs. He imagined another tooth would likely fall out tonight if that wretched scent pooling from beneath his own nose was any indication. The state of himself, the wizened spellblade he was, brought no placid joy to his tearing mind. His delicate face shifts into an offended sneer at the thought. “Was this what you wanted? Would this satisfy you?” (You coward).

His heart flutters with a bitter grief, the invasive feeling batting itself against his ribcage like a horde of drunken, pale moths. His thoughts sink into a familiar image of that sullen, blank mask and he imagines, detestably, the smear of arrogant triumph that would’ve been upon those lying, lacklustre lips. Oh, how blankly the (his, once) golden knight would’ve gloried amidst such a worthless victory. How dead his eyes would’ve been, if he could only see him now. Dead as the legs that lay beneath his singed waist, emboldened by a burning, dismal empty. He closes his eyes and breathes (breathes all those lonely thorns deep into the enclosure of his wizened body, to let them bloom amidst his strange, carnivorous hatred), slow, attempting to angle his mind with thoughts of the world he could barely see, eyes hardly (cowardly) filling his skull. Such a waste it would be, he mused, bothering his contemptuous mind with harrowing thoughts of that belittling, brooding boy. His closed eyes turn restful, eventually, and he allows himself the idle mercy of nothing, gleaming into a slumber that would, one day, come to pass. Beautiful. (So lonely).

He does not know I (we) watch him. It has been (and will be) a long eternity since we have been united, he and I (the sun and the parasites that feed from it) and I intend, valiantly (cowardly), to keep it as such. It is a piteous state he is in, I observe, quietly, with little malice; his slumber is laboured, gentle brows furrowed in a shrill horror, mouth rumbling with words I shan’t hear, eyes darting beneath their heavy, darkened lids, as if gleaming something corrupted I shall never dream upon. He is deep within a nightmare, I’ve gathered (and I shall do nothing to stop it. This is what you’ve done, to yourself. Didn’t I tell you? Would you have listened had I begged? Is it my fault?); I reach out a parenthetical palm of glimmering gold, radiant in its hue but muted in nature, in my nature, I suppose. I find my covered hand upon his cheek and the cold metal does little to soothe the fallowing litany of repentance (suffering) that befalls the spellblade. The thumb (our thumb) rubs into the disgruntled flesh and I observe, quietly, how strands of skin begin to sliver off, sloughing off with little resistance, as if flowing with little viscosity off his beatific frame. I dig my thumb in a bit harder, drawing darkened, gothic blood from the poor sod. I shush his murmurs with little avail, my revering words of shunned remembrance doing little to comfort the dark he had forced himself into. I attempt to deter the acute misery piling up within my stomach, like funeral stones, with a lullaby of regurgitated, aggravating prayer. Deliver his spirit, I whisper, conspiringly, to a ruler that shan’t hear my selfish words. For he, the poor sod before me, is undeserving of such little, effortless mercy. (I wish we were worthy, all of us. I wish, so quietly, as not to disturb anyone, particularly myself with such a thought, that we had been worthy. That the erdtree had accepted one, if not many. Perhaps then I would not be delighted to watch my slouching, former lover die before me). I pull my hand from his face. The reviled, ghastly dripping of somber red pours, slow, out of his body and I watch, idly mesmerized, by the destruction before me. He is, as beautiful as the day he left me, I note, to myself (not to us). I pull my hand toward my own face. I peel my golden skin from my head, revealing an omen to the world dressed in human skin, shaped to a haunting, abyssal expression, eyes blended to no colour. I tuck my helm beneath one of my arms and with the other I cradle the wound I made, lamenting it, traitorously. For little time do I exercise my gateway right to blasphemy; instead, I lean closer, the stench of death tickling at my cleanly (disheveled) chin, and I deliver a weary kiss above the small wound I have marred his sun-kissed face with. I back away. I linger. I watch him. (We, once). He sits, curse-ridden body wedged between the gears of empty unconscious and I can do nothing but watch. I cannot steel my heart, or perhaps melt it, to speak with him; so instead, I shall watch and I shall linger and I shall lament. As before me sits Rogier, my deepest failure. The one whom I have killed with my thankless, unconvincing, overpowering faith. I step on one of the many staunch, barbed branches that have sprouted from Rogier’s legs, the accursed nature beginning to bloom far past what was correct. I feel a decisive disgust drag along the pits of my stomach. Had I been more convincing. Had I been more humane. Had I been more like him, perhaps, Rogier would not be sat before me, a mockery of the wise, glamoured sorcerer he once was. What a cruel joke, this all was. I have worked so tirelessly to corrupt the spread of death, only to have it sprout from him, who is, yet, me. I shake my head, the thoughts beginning to dizzy my mind lasciviously. Oh, my once friend, rotting amidst your own accursed blood. Would it be a mercy to you, I wonder, if I had killed you? All those years ago? When we met… the memory gives way to a convicted, convoluted fondness that I shan’t emote upon my inhumane flesh.

My face remains as it always has: blank. For I am no mortal man. My mortality is measured by my capacity to be amidst the living; my patient breaths indicate no soul to be present. (Perhaps he, who makes us, took all the scornful feelings I had once felt, long before I reunited with the Clergyman. For what else could it be but I reuniting? I knew him, my destiny, long before I had been born, perhaps. Such a delusion, to comfort us, perhaps.) I had long since sloughed sensitivity from my senseless form and have embraced my will as a blade for the utilization of the derangement, estranged, beautiful Order; I am it and it was always I and I shall not (cannot) think past my own fixation with it, for that is what love had been, for us. Yes, we loved so deeply, didn’t we? He and I and I again. The Order had been our eclipse and we could do nothing but curl like infants beneath its blackened radiance. Destined, it was. A comfort, it would always be. (A shield, it would have to be. I could not face him; never properly. Rogier, whom I had loved. Was my love true? Was I alive? My sentience was a yearning curse and with its belated awakening had I loved Rogier. With an everlasting passion that would scour my mind and braid it with flowers of heresy. When I look at Rogier, I guilt and agonize over my fetid ignorance. For my love, surely, had cursed him too.) I am his; his persecution and surely I must… I place my Midas-touched, severed head onto the floor (I note with apathy how the thorns dance towards it) and I unsheathe my blade, the twins, inseparable. My blade, refracting against my being, shines with something wretched and I cannot bare the stench of the fickle kills that are marred into its united metals. I point my blade to his neck (I wish it was mine) and I stare, blankly, as I always will. Stoicism has been lured into my careening halfling-soul and I shan’t abandon it for it is I and I am me. It is too late for him. (Why can’t I do it? Why is my body frozen, as thorns have begun to wither amidst my iron-clad shoes? I stare, deeply, imposingly, at utter failure, my repentance and my mistake and I sting, the pain fresh along the lining of my stomach. Why can’t I move? Why do I shake? This is my possessive destiny. To slew that which has been corrupted by a stasis beyond our understanding; this is Destined and I am, at that moment, his galactic destiny. Move, I implore my body, shivering. I cannot shift my face to sorrow, even, the sinews of my flesh-ridden iron skull locking in place, cogs of muscles rusted and disused. I cannot feel anything. I cannot feel anything.) I, innocuously, stare at his face; he almost appears peaceful, face no longer scrunched in a gritty state of delirium. Now, his face is smooth and he is breathing softly, incredulously docile in spite of the blade pointed at him, as if my will was a mockery to him, as if I was no threat to someone as gallant as him. My face quivers, lip jutting slightly. The tip of my blade kisses his skin, it’s sharp valour caressing his warm flesh with a viscous silence. A sliver of blood. A small hole in his neck. His skin, so fragile, half rotted, already. He is dead (why can’t I do it?). In an empty of breath of his, I could almost make out the sound of my name (Darian, not D) and in my head, I scream.

In the end, I was weak. I gingerly wipe the sweat that trailed like streaks of rain down his furrowed brow, thanklessly, a sacrilegious smile burrowing into my expression, like a cluster of festering worms, my lips straining despite the barren visibility of my odd expression. Such a scene was nostalgic for me; I was the eldest of two, thunderous twins; bitter as dirt after a flood; and I was conditioned to nurture and I was conditioned to protect (I was conditioned to kill). Many times had he (I) fallen ill and I (he) would be the stark glimmer amidst a sandstorm of gaunt fog; I would take gentle care of him, D, and he, the twins, would cry, quietly, hushed words dying behind his stitched lips. I had decided to take him, my wilting old friend, to be bathed. His slumber was a reckoning I could not consult with; for no matter what I did, he would not wake (I was grateful, if only slightly. He would not have to look at me, in overabundant disgust, pondering why I had bothered with him). I washed his clothes, hung them up to dry, and I wondered, silently, where his sword had gone. I did not dare press too roughly against him, for fear he would shatter in my ironclad grip and scatter amidst the Liurnian winds. It is cold and it is an early morning and I’ve warmed the naturalistic water using an idle spell, my hands alight with a fledgling fire; my prowling faith diluting, enough for my spell to be a plausible temperature catalyst in the water. I had a bit of soap and little courage to divulge and enough guilt to compel me (to attempt to rid him of the filth that marred him and his radiant skin). My face quivers, distorted as the water my hands waded through (he still smells of it). I do not cry. I do not cry. I could not stomach a single tear, I believe, steadfast. The consecrated spell dies in my grip and I find my hands weaving into threads of lacklustre hair, idle clumps of a heady brown knitting themselves in my grip and pouring into the water. My stomach churns. I stare at him. He does not stare back. After a few more tense moments, I fish him from the water and do not submerge him into such a subversive luxury; instead, I pull my harmonious armour off my body and I separate my distended cape from the metal. I begin to dry him off, gently, conscientious of the disturbance I was both to him and to his life. I did not want him to see him; I feared him leering at my skin. I feared the possibility of him hooking me with a milky glint, eyes rotted in his skull, melting between his cantankerous cartilage. When he is dry, I clothe him, thanklessly, filled with a roasting, festering guilt; one that creates fingerprints of venerable sorrow in my skin, along my spine. I cradle him in my grip and he, subconsciously, curls closer to me. I do not cry. I… I do not cry.

He does not comprehend much when he reawakens, eyes blurry and still saturated with a grotesque sleep, deathly, daft slumber crumbling between his eyelashes. His head is exceedingly empty and he cannot justify the heat that radiates from his mind, the center of his forehead boiling with a sickly warmth, diluting his thoughts and bleeding the emotions right from his head. His mouth feels dry but he does not cry; not in alarm nor in agony. It feels like his eyes were attempting to crawl out of his spiralling head.

[alphavanilla]

Sorcerer Rogier

[sanctumofeld]

Other things I adore about this from image 1: exposing the sheer terror of Godfrey chasing after Wolfgang to either stop him from committing a crime, punish him for committing a crime, or to save him from the mob of angry villages he committed the crime against.

Image 2 is just them 'sneaking' into the capital after some choice words with the Draconic Tree Sentinel outside, which leads into image 3 that Godfrey is fucking gargantuan, and would have to stoop to fit through most doorways.

I wanted to take another screenshot earlier of the sheer hilarity of Godfrey standing at the entrance to a small ruin room (you know, the ones with the super narrow staircase down, leading into a tiny boss room, and there's treasure in the next room), to either block Wolfgang from going in out of concern... Only for Wolfgang to convince him its fine.

A moment later, when the inevitable sounds of battle ensue, Godfrey has to crawl/crouch his way down, and pound whatever is in there into a bloody pulp. Because this mod teleports them if they get too far, which means getting inventive with how, canonically, Godfrey would have got down to begin with.

[mohgwynn]

thorns, heresy, sacrifice (for alberich and rogier) :3c

from send three words for a drabble [accepting!!]

“I think I’d quite like that. Your head on a pikestaff.”

He isn’t serious, of course. Probably. But you can never really tell with Alberich.

God only knows how Rogier got into this mess — agreeing to this insane man’s even more insane attempt at magical discovery. Maybe it’s because his state of decay has reached a point where he no longer worries what will become of him. Or maybe he’s genuinely curious if the dark-clad heretic’s plan will work. After all, despite the fact that Alberich typically talks almost exclusively in serpentine spirals and invasive nonsequiturs, he isn’t necessarily a poor salesman. He makes the world sound more interesting, if nothing else, with just a pinch of magic. He makes the impossible seem within reach.

Perhaps it’s just a fool’s periscope.

Or perhaps it’s a stroke of genius.

Regardless, here Alberich sits, comfortably cross-legged on the floor before Rogier’s seat, awkwardly trying to figure out a way to hold his scythe’s blade like a butcher’s knife.

(He is having, at best, moderate success.)

“That’s usually how this ‘sacrifice’ thing goes, y’know. Just a quick slice is all it takes. Doesn’t just have to be the throat, either. Any place that’ll leak the essence of one’s life. The upper arm, or that soft spot between the thighs, or juuust between the right ribs. You get blood — lots of it! And out with it, like salmon in a stream, comes a person’s very soul — just as wriggly, just as wet.”

The Outer Gods only know how Rogier is managing to keep his grimacing to a non-noticeable minimum as Alberich continues to spout his… explanation… or whatever it is he’s babbling about. His reasons for what he’s doing, or something. His incredibly not-reassuring promise that Rogier is different and will remain safe in the heretic’s white-clawed hands.

But he’s going to get nowhere if he keeps trying to finagle his scythe the way he is.

Ahem.

Alberich looks up at the sound of his fellow sorcerer clearing his throat, to find that Rogier is handing him his decorative rapier politely by the hilt.

(Oh… yeah, yeah. That’s a smarter idea, isn’t it?)

Alberich grins, tossing his scythe — with an unnecessarily noisy clatter — off to the side. “See, this is why I like you,” the invader says, taking the sword with a nod of his head. “You’re just like me. A quick thinker, sometimes. Offering up that which you cherish for the sake of discovery. Never afraid to dabble in a bit of heresy. Love it. Now…”

With the sultry grace of a lover preparing to bed their betrothed, Alberich lifts the blanket that covers Rogier’s blighted legs, laying it flat upon his lap and slowly rubbing it smooth. He then takes one of Rogier’s heels into his hands, placing his boot upon his own knee, eyelessly — but very keenly — studying the dark, fly-dotted thorns.

He makes his pick quickly enough, two dainty fingers pinching at one of the longer, thicker vines that jut from just below Rogier’s knee.

For a moment, he simply studies the texture, rubbing the rotting thing between thumb and forefinger. Leathery, almost, like a corpse it feels, cool enough to trick one into thinking their fingers have gotten wet. Smaller, invisible thorns cover the naked stretches of the vine’s surface, giving patches of it a peculiar sandpaper-like texture. Maggots wriggle and writhe in the holes they’ve bored into the plant’s flesh. It stinks enough to make the average man gag.

But Alberich is not the average man.

“Beautiful…” he half-whispers as he readies the rapier, placing one sharp edge of its blade against the base of the root. “Count of three: one, twooo—”

He slices it off before three.

Rogier winces and sucks air through his teeth in pain, focusing on his breathing as the detached vine almost seems to come alive for a moment, wriggling like a frog’s legs under salt, hissing as the deadly ich seeps from its veins like marrow from a sickly bone. Quickly, fast as lightning, Alberich tosses the rapier to the side — it clatters noisily beside the scythe — and cups his hands under the vine’s leaking orifice, catching its draining life within pale, pristine palms.

“All it takes is a splinter of one’s soul,” Alberich says as Rogier hisses out his pained breaths, his own voice having become rather reverent in tone — like one bowing before a vicar, praying for absolution. “Some may think that blood is nothing more than a bodily fluid in animals, but— ah, we know better, don’t we? We who dabble in the arts of darkness and death. Within the blood lies a person’s delicate clockwork — tick, tock, tick, tock…”

The entire time he’s speaking, he’s moving his hands in graceful, dedicated motions. Once the black ich has filled his cupped palms, he closes his hands together like one holding a butterfly, and brings his tar-leaking fingers towards his chest.

His words are not spells — no, not at all — yet it would seem the vibrations from his chest alone are enough to tamper with the substance’s very makeup, like compressing mud into stone. (Which is not a very off comparison.) His palms glow faintly, strangely black in its absence of light, almost as if casting a shadow more than projecting the sun’s corona, yet still somehow too brilliant to stare at directly. He concentrates…

“The glintstones produced by this ritual turn red from the blood,” he says. “At least, that’s why I’m assuming they’re red. I’ve only ever done this with humans, after all. And the occasional demihuman. And once on a runebear. But perhaps it is just the colour of animal essence that turns the stone red, like blue-green is that of the earth’s. Red like love, and passion, and hate... Animal qualities — qualities of the soul. I can only assume, then, given the nature of these thorns, the stone will be purple or black…”

A shrug. “As long as it matches my outfit, I’ll be happy.”

Time passes in silence.

Once the pain has finally calmed enough that Rogier no longer recoils from having this not-quite-a-piece of himself removed, he leans forward curiously to watch the dark sorcerer work — his focused expression and unshifting hands; the galaxy of stars within the darkness that glows around his nimble, narrow fingers.

Then, “Moment of truth…”

And when Alberich finally opens his hands, just as he had promised, in the center of one palm lies a jagged shard — no bigger than an average arrowhead — of glintstone.

But it’s the strangest thing, really…

Though the ichor which had seeped from the root was black, and the roots themselves were like leather; and though the blight itself embodies death, as dark as death, as empty as death…

The glintstone scrap is gold.

“… Huh.”

For a moment more, silence.

Then, all seriousness leaves Alberich’s body, and he is back to his more flamboyant, rowdy self.

The dark sorcerer places one hand on his hip while the other holds the gold glintstone up high for both himself — despite his blindness — and Rogier to examine. “Fascinating…” He sounds genuinely enraptured by this discovery, a more genuine emotion in his tone than anything anyone who knows him well is most likely used to hearing slink through his bluish lips.

But then, his expression scrunches into something suspicious, brow furrowing beneath his blindfold, lips pursing in disapproving disbelief. “Where did you say you got cursed again?” he asks, twisting the stone so the torchlight reflects off its every facet. “Given my theory, I would assume a golden gem would only be achievable through sacrificing a god…”

Rogier goes silent. So does Alberich.

From beneath the brim of his hat, Alberich studies Rogier’s stoic expression — those serious green eyes and relaxed, muted lips — and he frowns. Frowns, because this is the first moment he’s really realising that Rogier maybe — no, no, definitely — is hiding something from him. And it pains him. Pains him, because he doesn’t know if that means he has to worry — if this friend of his, the first he’s made in years, is somehow going to betray him. If he should fight. If he should flee. If he should kill. If he should continue to trust as much as he has.

(Trust…)

And this is when he realises — oh, dear, how stupid of him…

He actually trusts the blighted sorcerer.

After so long, so alone, so distrusting and disgusted with the world. After all this time being careful and cautious with his curiosity and conversations. After swearing to never get close to another again…

(Rogier… hah, of all people, Rogier…)

…

A shrug. “Ah, well. It still matches my outfit.”

The gem is pocketed quickly, and Alberich once again drapes the blanket over Rogier’s legs.

Thoughts for another day.

(Or never, ever again.)

[slumbering-in-death]

"Fia?" Rogier stepped into the room, his legs still a bit of a chore to move but he made due as he studied her carefully. "Are you happy with how things have turned out? With Godwyn?" He glanced around the room she seemingly was being kept in. His worried expression focused back on her. "Is all this what you had in mind?"

She looks upon Rogier with a thoughtful expression. It shifts into one of light unease.

“In truth… if everything went the way it was supposed to, I would not be here to answer. I was close enough to death as it were. I could barely perceive the world around me in any form. Not touch. Not sight.”

She closes her eyes and draws a deep breath, then smiles.

“So you could say it all turned out much better than expected. And if you are concerned with my confinement, well, it is not like I move around much anyways. My purpose has been fulfilled. As far as I am concerned, I am content, and retired.”

[mirroredshadows]

@spellbladerogier​ cont. from here

Rogier looked at Jay in slight confusion for a moment, until he slowly recalled their exchange before. In his fevered, dying state at the time he had thought it had been but a dream. “You’ll have to forgive me, I’m still not sure if I can walk.”

He thought about trying, but he hadn’t even removed the thick blanket to even see the state his lower half was in. The sorcerer also didn’t want the other man to see the condition if it was something hard to stomach. Rogier’s hands rested against the soft fabric, slightly trembling with unspoken anxiety. He couldn’t just sit here forever, though, could he? Not now.

“Could you lend me a hand, perhaps?”

What sort of new-friend would Jay be if he couldn’t help his companion up? A heartless one, no doubt.

Jay extends a hand down to the spellblade to help him up-- Rogier’s not as heavy as he thought he’d be, and he does his best to make sure there’s not too much weight on the other’s legs. He positions himself so that Rogier can lean on him if needed.

“Do lean on me if you require the aid,” though he’d much prefer it if Rogier was capable of standing now. “And don’t fret should your legs remain hurt, I’ve probably seen worse horrors in my lifetimes.”

[royalreliquary]

Moving a thread with @spellbladerogier from discord to here.

"Yeah, odd pair of buggers," Blackguard had told Rogier. "Scrawny little one ridin' around on a bloodhound knight of all things. Don't bother me none what you are, s'long as you got an appetite for prawns and the runes to pay for 'em. Asked me about some of that demigod nonsense you're always goin' on about. Stank to hell, too. Thought I saw 'em head off that way." 

A perpetual fog shrouds the lake, hiding the true shape of the isle. Only the pointed tip of the tower can be seen poking out from the veil, of the sort that used to house scholars conducting private study, but now sat mostly abandoned, their scrolls and tools waterlogged or covered in spiderwebs. And they had so many stairs, too... Lothric was confined to the bottom floor, but at least the one they were camping out in was reasonably roomy, and shrouded in trees so their presence went unnoticed. He peels some shell off the prawn he'd bought from the grouchy man by the shack and looks out at Lorian, stationed outside the entrance and looking pensively into the fog. "Do you hear something?"

-

Rogier hummed thoughtfully as he nibbled on one of the prawns as he made his way towards the tower. Curious, truly, of these people mentioned. Of course he wouldn't want to needlessly bother them if his presence became a problem but he supposed a little hello would do. And if Boggart was right and they had interest in the Prince of Death, well, perhaps they'd get along just fine. 

The fog was a bit of a hindrance as he walked through, eventually using a light from his staff for guidance. Not wishing to startle anyone with his presence, he eventually cleared his throat and called out. "Hello? Greetings from a fellow sorcerer!" Rogier had to chuckle a little for his small joke. He knew what these places used to be, so long abandoned. But perhaps these new guests were of that nature as well?

-

Lorian can be heard before he appears, the metallic clink-clink of the decorative chains that hung from his armor jingling as he steps out of the fog. Flies buzz around him, crawling in and out of the eyeslits of his helm and the gaps in his armor. He reeks of rotting flesh, his body decaying within its shell. So far it had not affected his movement, so he had high hopes that when it all sloughed away completely, he'd be much better off. 

"A sorcerer?" Lothric calls from the tower. "...yes, I suppose I am one of those. Please, come up. Don't be alarmed by Lorian, he's not dangerous unless you make yourself a threat. You won't do that, will you?" 

To punctuate the statement, Lorian growls, the sound wet and choked, forced from the black tarry sludge that used to be his lungs. 

-    

Oh! Oh...he had not expected something quite like Lorian. The smell of death, and the flies, he was more than familiar with. But to see such a beastly armored thing - certainly a Shadow - well, this was a first for him. He blinked, almost tempted to reach out a hand and touch despite the very clearly bad idea that was. Rogier stopped himself as he heard the voice continue to speak, and he shook his head. Likely for Lorian to see, if he could, before he spoke. "Of course not. I'm simply a curious sort, not too keen on causing trouble." 

He smiled, tipping up his hat even as he heard the armored-figure growl at him. "It's a pleasure. I heard tell that you have questions about, ah, Godwyn? Perhaps we could share our knowledge together. I'm very curious about your friend here. Maybe I'd even be able to help...ah, but I shouldn't get ahead of myself! I am Rogier." He began to step into the tower to join this other mysterious person. If he had a Shadow, was it his? Or an unusual companion? If he was about to meet an Empyrean, well...this would be quite an interesting day.

-    Rogier was more than familiar with Omens, given he'd gone up against Margit many times. At least by this account, it was on more friendly terms. Lothric and Lorian...not names he'd heard before, which was interesting. He smiled politely still, as he greeted Lothric, nodding as he spoke. "I see. Sounds rather similar to Those Who Live in Death, but I'd never seen someone recently come under such a state...usually they're already skeletons. Perhaps it's different." He cocked his head to the side in thought before he went to find a spot to sit, taking out one of his own prawns to snack on. "And that sounds like a fine deal. I used to be a bit of a scholar, so I should be helpful in answering your questions, I think. Where do you hail from, if you don't mind me asking?" He took a bite after peeling off the shell.

-

Lothric has set his lantern in the center of the floor, casting a warm glow over the spiderweb-covered crystals and waterlogged books scattered around the base of the tower. There isn't any hiding what he is. The long horns sweeping back from above his ears can't be covered by any hood, but Lorian wouldn't allow any harm to come to him. And if the man selling the boiled prawns was anything to go by, not everybody reached for their sword the moment they saw him.

 "Lothric," he introduces himself, flicking bits of prawn shell onto the floor. "And you'd be right. The man in the metal mask said something about him, but that he didn't know much about all that demigod nonsense, as he called it... We'll exchange questions, how about that? Though I'm afraid I don't know very much about what happened to Lorian. He was simply dead, and then he wasn't."

-

Rogier was more than familiar with Omens, given he'd gone up against Margit many times. At least by this account, it was on more friendly terms. Lothric and Lorian...not names he'd heard before, which was interesting. He smiled politely still, as he greeted Lothric, nodding as he spoke. "I see. Sounds rather similar to Those Who Live in Death, but I'd never seen someone recently come under such a state...usually they're already skeletons. Perhaps it's different." He cocked his head to the side in thought before he went to find a spot to sit, taking out one of his own prawns to snack on. "And that sounds like a fine deal. I used to be a bit of a scholar, so I should be helpful in answering your questions, I think. Where do you hail from, if you don't mind me asking?" He took a bite after peeling off the shell.    

- "Yes, well... I was under a considerable amount of duress at the time. I can't recall exactly how I did it..." Lothric takes a bite of his shrimp, chewing pensively. "All I can recall is that I prayed harder than I'd ever prayed before, and meant it. Something must have heard me." 

 Lorian's armor creaks as he dips his head. Such an awful night. Everything ripped away from them all at once. He still remembers the smell of smoke and the tastes of blood coating his tongue. 

 At Rogier's question, Lothric glances away, ragged wings folding tighter too his back. "Somewhere in Altus. I never learned the name of it, but I could see the capital walls from my window. It doesn't matter. We can't go back there, anyway. Now, tell me what you know of the golden lineage.. What does it mean?"