Complete ✪ Finweald A Tsun's Sentimentality

[Lady N]

Advent Lost

"Yes... it really is that simple, just place your hand upon the monolith and think of the name of the one you lost."

Those were the words the priest told Chelsea as she headed towards the ominous-looking monolith. Maybe for the best that it had such a look. It stood for the deaths of people tricked into playing Terrasphere. Tricked into thinking it was safe. Lured into a deathtrap where the penalty was permanent.

Chelsea walked quietly. Every now and again a lone or small group would pass her by coming back. Some with tears others smiling. Diffierent ways to look at seeing the soul of the dead. Why was Chelsea here? Even if a "soul" or visage of any kind appeared. It would just be a stupid saved image. Something the game was letting people see, like some sick teasing joke.

But no, she was now before the Advent Lost. The Nexon needed to test it. Just to see.

"...Okay you big stupid rock. Show me.."

Chelsea prepared to touch the stone, but she hesitated. Did she want to know...?

Could she even trust what she saw?

 

[Jin]

Does anyone want to know the truth, really?

He recalled the last time that he was called before this strange monument by another Traveler to ascertain the fate of one of the lost; but Jin had left before the revelation could be put to question. In the other world, when someone died, people gathered to "mourn" them. In some cultures, they "celebrated" the life of the lost. Death was an affair. In this world, that was not the convention. There was a rock, and an impersonal rock at that, with no innate connection to any one person or family.

Jin strayed morbidly close to Advent Lost on this occasion not for any sentimental attachment, but because he found himself interested in understanding.

What does a person find in the knowledge that someone they lost is gone? He watched some small number wander past, somber and sullen after their morose question was answered. There were people who wanted it strangely, but when they received it, they were not satisfied. They wept.

Jin frowned. Was there no joy? He only ever saw something he felt no connection with. That was as true here as it was in the other place.

He recalled the rain outside on the day of his father's funeral. He recalled the way his mother held his hand and they watched his aunts and uncles and his grandmother sobbing. He remembered the words they said about how he was gone too soon, their apologies that Theo would grow up without a father, that the man would miss the best memories of the boy's life. The man's friends, too, stood by and had a handful of words for the departed.

None of them bothered to ask how he felt. They apologized, they wished him well, they hoped he was not taking it too hard. They told him stories about the kind of man his Father had been, as if he didn't know better than any of them exactly what his Father was. Funerals, events like this- they were for people who could no longer take anything for them. Not for the ones who were left behind.

So, when he happened to notice the woman who hesitated in front of the stone, he paused several feet away from her. What was it that people said in these situations? That stupid sentiment... ah, yes. "Sorry for your loss." He led with that because it always seemed to be the right social convention in this scenario. "Someone close to you?"

@Lady N

 

[Lady N]

Advent Lost

".Hmm?"

Yeesh, bad enough that she was so hesitant. Now there was someone watching her. Although, maybe she was a tiny bit relieved at the distraction. A quick shift of the eyes changed to a complete turn towards the man.

"I haven't lost anyone stupid. I am just testing something. I'm honestly curious how this big magic block works. You should try not to be so assumptions about what others are doing."

Her eyes locked onto him. Although her stoic face would not show it, she was happy with this. At least with this type of situation...

Chelsea was used to dealing with it.

"Hmph! Whatever this big rock shows people is likely some sort of program anyway. All of this is. It's... more like looking up a death record than a soul if you ask me..."

Sadly that was exactly what she hoped it was.
An answer to whether her father had passed at any point.

" It probably doesn't even record all deaths. ...I would know if I had not been interrupted."

She stood there, folded her arms, and regardless of what the man did or said. Kept staring. Showing no interest in turning back to the Advent Lost.

@Jin

 

[Jin]

"I haven't lost anyone stupid. I am just testing something. I'm honestly curious how this big magic block works. You should try not to be so assumptions about what others are doing."

He smiled faintly at that.

Her words were harsh, perhaps unnecessarily so, but they did not seem to upset the man, "Ah yes, of course," his eyes closed a moment as he swept past her toward the rock. "I suppose we are the same in that way. I've not lost anyone, either. Not anyone of consequence, at least."

His fingers reached up to brush the monument, the image of his Father at the forefront of his mind. If this stone could manifest imagery of the fallen, surely it would prompt a shade of the man to appear before him? Jin waited for several moments, only to be met with silence. If it did have such a power, he wagered that there were stipulations.

"Hmph! Whatever this big rock shows people is likely some sort of program anyway. All of this is. It's... more like looking up a death record than a soul if you ask me..."

"I'm sure that you're probably right," he added after his own experiment. He took a few steps back, taking up the spot he stood in moments before. Now she was staring at him. He offered a bow of his head. "But that being the case, it wouldn't do much for people who generally came to see those who they lost. Pity."

"It probably doesn't even record all deaths. ...I would know if I had not been interrupted."

Jin offered the woman a tight smile in exchange for her last words.

"...would you, I wonder," the Bloodsworn mused as he turned. It seemed there was little to be learned from the monument after all, at least, for him. "Then I should leave you to it." He raised a hand in farewell.

"Good luck with your quest for knowledge, though I do not believe there is aught more to be learned here."

@Lady N

 

[Lady N]

Advent Lost

"Good luck with your quest for knowledge, though I do not believe there is aught more to be learned here."

How annoying. He wouldn't just go away already...

Wait.

He was going away?

Chelsea stood in a moment of shock as for once someone said their piece and actually was leaving. They weren't interested in staying and chattering endlessly about irrelevant or stupid things. They were not teasing her or talking about ridiculous hero fantasies in a death trap.

Oh, she was aware he had attempted to call her out for being here. It was this though, that had taken her by surprise. It was a rare event and...

Boo.

Of all the times it could happen. It was now when she would have preferred it. She wasn't scared of learning the truth, of seeing her father. Of knowing the game claimed him. Nor was she scared of not finding anything, not learning a damn thing from this monolith. Leaving the question unanswered still... and her sorrow granted no direction in which to flow.

No. The Nexon surely was not scared at all.

"....You... are you going? No introductions or..."

Her voice was normally quiet with little volume for her normal speech. Here it was a hindrance. He probably did not hear her.

Fine then.

"I didn't need to be bothered by you anyway. Go wander off, and go kill some goblin or something! ...Tsk."

Swiftly turning back to the Advent Lost. The young CEO used her anger to thrust her hand onto its surface. She closed her eyes tightly while gritting her teeth, and focused on memories of her father.

How even without a mother for most of her life, he had raised her with little help from nannies. Preferring to instill his virtues into her personally. The virtues of a Nexon. Of course, she did not know if he had been in Terrasphere at all, nor what his user name may have been. Still, that was a character he would have played. There was only one CEO of Nexus Corporation.

Father...
Matthias Nexon.

@Jin

 

[Jin]

"....You... are you going? No introductions or..."

She had said something, certainly, but Jin had not understood it. He turned back to glance in her direction, intent and listening in case she repeated herself. He was rewarded with more words, though if they were the same or different he might never know.

"I didn't need to be bothered by you anyway. Go wander off, and go kill some goblin or something! ...Tsk."

Again, she was needlessly vitriolic, which did not surprise him. The first instance had given him a moment's pause. This repetition inclined him toward the belief that this was just in the woman's character. A flaw, perhaps, but what human was not flawed?

This woman felt a need to violently reject his presence, as if his being there upset her. He tilted his head curiously as he watched her turn back toward the stone. It occurred to him that there might be some dissonance between her words and how she truly felt; if her hesitation and her insistence that it was his presence that delayed her from action both stemmed from something she desperately wanted to keep hidden.

Unwittingly, she had unlocked something dangerous: she had piqued Jin's curiosity. Now he would not leave until he was either satisfied or disappointed. He haunted the monument behind her like a shade in his own right. Were he to speak, it would only prompt her to insult or verbally attack him more. No. It was better to wait.

And so, he watched, morbidly fascinated to learn if this woman would find what she was looking for where he had not.

@Lady N

 

[Lady N]

Advent Lost

Even when the dark swordsman had turned and decided to stay, he would be right to say nothing. Although maybe it did not matter so much, Chelsea was now fully committed and had put all of her focus into this. Even if a goblin appeared and threatened to stab her right here and now. It would not reach her.

She tried.

She brought up every memory she could.

"...Sigh. Father."

She did not originally intend to utter any words at all, and yet she did.

Nothing but a lone bird chirp on a nearby tree answered her. Her eyes opened slightly, maybe she needed to have them open to see something? No results. She would get no answers here. Chelsea should have been relieved, after all, it meant she could just consider her father alive and perhaps not even in this game.

But...

It was too late, The tears came, her ice wall broken from forcing herself to search for so many memories the Nexon had compartmentalized to create the strength to continue. She remembered the time her mother died when she was 6 years old.

"A Nexon must be strong to remain on the forefront, but a Nexon must know when to cry. It's okay to cry now and be strong tomorrow. my daughter."

Had Chelsea's father even said that? It was a blurry memory but in her state now, it felt like what he would have said.

And so she broke. it was frustration, a mix of anger and sadness at her situation. Her admittingly delicate fists slammed against the monolith as she gritted her teeth angrily. Tears flowed freely, unrestrained by any Nexon pride if only for a moment.

"S-S-S-Stupid rock! Piece of shit... I hate this, I hate, hate, hate this...stupid piece of shit for a rock, game, all of it..."

Her forehead hit the cool surface of black. The Nexon slid down onto her knees. One final memory came to her.

Her father told her about the song her mother used to put her to bed. It was always calming to Chelsea even today... she would choke back her tears and with what will was left unbroken she would quietly sing it to herself.

After a few minutes, Chelsea would stand back up and wipe her eyes with her sleeve. A single final sniffle before she shot a cold look at the man behind her.

"*Stare*...Why are you still here? I don't know what you think you saw but you saw nothing, understand? ...Please."

It was not like he knew her name unless he had decided to use investigation mode perhaps. Still displaying that sort of weakness to anyone was dangerous and the young CEO knew it. Hence why she spent all of her energy daily not showing it.

She briskly passed the black-clad man by without another word.

She was done here.

@Jin

 

[Jin]

He was uncertain of what had transpired, and knew no details of what he witnessed. She abused the rock in the same way she had treated him earlier, but with much more violent emotion. The tears flowed, and he watched; but Jin was not a voice of comfort. The only rock that might offer her support was the cold, black surface of a monument that they both ultimately seemed to find no purpose in.

She remained on the ground crying for some time, and his only recourse was to wait. He recalled what it felt like to be alone. He remembered how cold and dark it was in that place, without hope. Jin also remembered how there had been no hands to reach out for him, and how he hadn't wanted any.

The ultimate kindness he could extend was his stoic respect for her solidarity. To not learn her name, or speak her truth; and to not share in her pain, because it was not his burden to bear. He would not laugh at her torment. He would not jeer her struggles.

"...Why are you still here? I don't know what you think you saw but you saw nothing, understand? ...Please."

"I'm not sure what you mean," he spoke back to her over his shoulder, closing his eyes as he began to depart in the opposite direction. "I didn't see anything at all." Secrets were the only currency that the Bloodsworn dealt in; and for someone who he did not know to trust him with one like this, he would cash it in with Charon when he went to his own grave.

He stopped long enough to spare a glance toward Advent Lost, now convinced that the rumors made it out to be something more fantastic than it truly was. His eyes narrowed, vague contempt for the societal constructs formed around death and the rituals that it incurred upon the living. Grief, primarily: he knew so many people who had been stricken with profound sadness.

Now, he knew another.

They were both done with the glorified rock, it seemed.