#cataclysmus

　　　The whole situation was turning into a mess. Their original intentions to climb Zaude and stop Alexei's plans had escalated far beyond what any of them imagined. The fight itself hadn't been easy, even when it was nine vs one, Alexei had showed that the title of Commandant was more than for show but even he hadn't been prepared to witness the truth of Zaude's existance when the core shot power up into the skies —

Raven's grip on his weapon tightens as he stares up at the sky. It falls to pieces and opens gaping holes to a monster above, his allies watching in shock and awe themselves. The adephagos. It was real and it was never gone and to think that Zaude's blastia core had been a shield protecting their world.

That fool.

The blastia above their head starts to crackle and go out of control, sparkes fly in the air above their head. The group have to prepare to run but Raven's eyes have fallen forward. Yuri is still facing Alexei but Alexei isn't even looking at the young man. He doesn't understand this uncomfortable feeling in his gut.

Is it okay for it to end this way?

Yuri takes the distraction and gives the commandant a brutal blow with his sword. Raven feels chills up his spine, he hears Karol and the others voices at his side. They needed to leave. Flynn was getting back up after taking a blow for Yuri but the young captain is clearly worn out.

No it couldn't end like this.

The core is threatening to fall on all of them and Zaude itself was shaking under their feet. The thing wasn't going to remain in the air much longer and they were all very aware. Yet when everyone moved back, Raven moved forward and dashed passed the retreating Yuri. It was selfish of him but thinking of everything he went through ending like this - it wasn't right.

Raven's sure someone is calling his name but he doesn't even register his own voice screaming over all the noise. Chaos and panic had broken out as the core is finally unable to sustain itself in the sky. Raven feels like he's never moved this fast in his life, tackling Alexei so hard he nearly knocks the air out of himself. The core falls and just narrowly misses the two of them when they hit the ground. The blastia core hits the roof and shatters into large and small bits, bringing up a plume of smoke.

❝ Raven!! ❞

❝ Where's Yuri!? ❞

❝ Come on, it's dangerous here right now. ❞

When it happened, Yuri didn't have any time to think. His instinct just knew Raven had brought him and Alexei here together for a reason. That the man was trying to mend things between them. Truth was, Yuri had never hated Alexei before everything that happened on that journey. He had been hoping Alexei would turn out to be reasonable when he'd met him personally at Heliord. He had been angry when he was proven wrong, but... also disappointed.

And he knew Raven still respected what Alexei had once been. He had made that clear at Heracles. He had made it clear when he'd saved Alexei from being crushed under the debris of that core. Part of him had been confused and maybe a little angry that Raven had done that that day, but... he knew for a fact if Flynn hadn't recovered and had lost himself for a while that Yuri would never have let him be crushed either. Plus, at the time... Yuri didn't have time to think about it before he fell from Zaude's edge.

That was probably why he had moved so fast when he recognized the intent the soldier had. The way the soldier pulled out a knife and went straight for Alexei. Probably a bout of revenge. It could have any kind of revenge, really. General revenge for what Alexei had done, anger at being betrayed, possibly having lost a loved one because of Alexei... and Yuri didn't not understand that, but stabbing the man now after he'd made it a point that he felt like shit about it and wanted to atone made it pointless.

If it was Ragou he would have understood. If it was Cumore he would have understood. They had no remorse. Yuri could tell in their final moments that they immediately caved and reverted right back to being the selfish scum they always were. If Alexei was truly pained by his actions all amounting to nothing and was truly trying to better himself, he wasn't someone they could just stab now and say it had to be done. It wasn't that simple at this point.

And if Alexei died now, Raven wouldn't take it well. Raven had been through enough. Lost enough. Almost lost his own life. Yuri wasn't interested in seeing Raven have to grieve more than the story his eyes already told Yuri. More than the way his eyes looked that day at the bridge in Dahngrest in the middle of the night.

For a second or two, the knight that had stabbed Yuri by mistake hadn't realized that mistake. Hadn't yet processed that Yuri had shielded Alexei and had taken the knife in his place. It was enough time for one of the two of them to act where Yuri couldn't. Even if the man's face clearly registered a mistake afterward, he had still attempted to kill an atoning man that even the emperor himself had agreed would be given time to atone.

"One of you grab him!"

These visits to Dahngrest were becoming more and more commonplace in Rita's life. She shouldn't have been surprised, really. When it was convenient for Brave Vesperia to use it as a meeting place, of course she would come all the way there to meet them. This was one such day, but at the same time Rita was there to share what she'd been learning about potential replacements for the blastia. Progress was, admittedly, slower than she would have liked. A small amount of progress was better than nothing, and she was eager to share what she'd learned.

Of course, some things never really did change. Just as it had been when Rita had first set foot in the guild city with the others, Dahngrest proved to be as lively as anything. By then, Rita was used to navigating the streets and avoiding colliding with others. Such was the benefit of needing to come to Dahngrest as often as she and the others had. She strode forward with confidence, dipping and moving about to avoid various guild members. That was, of course, until someone caught her eye for just a moment.

There, moving in the opposite direction to her as the crowd thinned, was someone clad in a mage's cloak. Their hood was covering their face just enough so Rita couldn't immediately identify them as she walked closer to her destination. For just a heartbeat, Rita looked back and decided it wasn't anything out of the ordinary. Rita wasn't the only mage out there, even if she didn't often don her mage's cloak. Maybe it was just another mage getting ready to go somewhere else in Dahngrest. That was the thought process, at least, until Rita thought more about the encounter.

She squinted. The more she thought about it, the less sense it made. She liked to think that she knew at least a majority of the mages that hailed from Aspio. Even the ones who had been scattered by what had happened to their beloved city when Tarqaron rose should have been recognizable to her, but she couldn't put a name or face to this stranger. Assuming they were a mage at all, of course. Was someone parading around like a mage? For what purpose? Rita's mind raced, and she did the only thing she could think to do. Her pace picked up as she started to follow the stranger. Something wasn't right.

"H-Hey! You!" It was the first thing Rita could even think to say. Not so genius mage of her, she knew, but she was caught off guard. Somehow, she managed to catch up and tried to get in front of the stranger. She was right back to squinting as she looked him over. "Pretty sure there aren't any mages from Aspio living around here. And I think I'd know a cloak like that anywhere. So who the hell are you?"

The first thing that crossed Karol’s mind was that he had to have been looking at a ghost, right? There was no way that Alexei, the former Commandant of the Knights, the man who had actually tried to kill them and brought the Adephagos into the world… was currently standing in front of him in the middle of Raven’s (Was it Raven’s? He hadn’t been given false information, right?) residence.

Karol could only stare blankly at Alexei, eyes slowly drifting from Alexei’s shocked expression down to the sword that was now pointed at him and, for a scary moment, he felt as if he were about to pass out. By some miracle, he hung in there, if only because he convinced his brain that if he did pass out, he was as good as dead. His mouth opened. And then promptly shut again when no words came out. All thought seemed to cease as Karol and Alexei just stood there.

And then, the floor creaked just slightly underneath Karol’s feet and with that one tiny sound, panic rushed through Karol’s body as he dove back, slamming his own back against the wall. Pulling his bag up between him and Alexei, he quickly opened the flap and began to reach for something, ANYTHING, to throw at the sudden intruder as he SCREAMED as hard as he could. “B-BACK UP!! Stay back!! I-I may not look it but I-I’m plenty strong and– and–”

Pulling his personal cup used for camping out of the bag, he threw it as fast and as hard as he could, just barely missing the white haired man in front of him. “What are you doing here!? Where’s– Where’s Raven?! What did you do to Raven?! This– This is his house, right?! Why are you here!?”

　　　Okay so yeah, perhaps taunting the assailant right after getting slashed in the face hadn't been the biggest game move but Raven was nothing if cocky and maybe it would convince Alexei the would wasn't as bad as it felt it was. Alexei wasn't having any of that however as he is now the one pushing between him and the red eyes, who simply just looks amused as he swipes Raven's blood off his blade with a sleeve.

Alexei's words were very much a demand that Raven step down and– and that had probably been a good idea. His face burned something fierce. On top of feeling a panic build within his chest when he found that he could not open his eye and attempts to try only cause more agonizing pain for him. Biting down hard on his bottom lip to stiffle any sort of noise that would indicate problems and pain.

" all yers... "

Raven took a few steps back and squated to the ground as Alexei's weapon collides with the red eyes blade. He could already tell this wound had felt far too grand to heal with his own abilities but be damned if he shouldn't try anyway. Just touching the tender skin was enough to make his vision swim for a second.

" shit. " he cussed under his breath.

He raised his head enough to watch Alexei through his uninjured eye. Despite his comment about two on one he sure as hell wasn't doing anything. Hells, he should help, even though Alexei demanded it be left to him. Disregarding the pain he crawls over to his fallen bow to get his hands on while they were distracted. He wiped blood off onto his pants before checking the limbs and bowstring for any potential damage when the bow forcefully snapped open upon impact.

Once all was clear did Raven slip an arrow from his quiver and pull it back on the string. His teeth grit from the pain that rushes through his left side that caused his hand to tremble and a fear if he let go the arrow would veer off in the wrong direction as he struggled to keep his eye on the target.

Going for the weapon had been his first and second mistake as the red eyes saw him aiming while clashing with Alexei. A near hysterical laugh rips from them in his face as their boot comes up just for kicking Alexei right in the gut to knock him off balance. Twisting his body to rush for Raven instead while he hesitated on taking the shot.

"Alexei?"

Well. That was the last face he'd expected to see at the festival. But stranger things had happened, hadn't they? Like whatever kept happening while he was wearing the mask he had on. Might as well try to make the most of this encounter, right? How did he even approach it?

One way to find out, he supposed. He approached, moving past the cherry trees and moving further down the trail until he'd managed to catch up. At least Alexei was easy to pick out.

"What're the chances, am I right?" Raven put on a smile. A part of him was pretty sure he'd get called Schwann. After all, Raven was just a role as far as Alexei had been concerned, right? Something to be thrown away? Maybe. Raven just figured he'd see where this went. Find out what Alexei was doing there.

@cataclysmus

○○○○○ | ATTRACTION ●○○○○ | AFFECTION ●●○○○ | INTEREST ○○○○○ | LOYALTY ●●○○○ | TRUST

Attraction: Not his type. Sorry, Lexi.

Affection: To a point, he has affection. Before everything went down Yuri did at least have some hope of respect for Alexei. Flynn also deeply admired him and for a little while, Yuri really hoped the knights would be set straight by him, but he had his doubt because of how crazy everything was and because knights still got away with so much harmful chaos and nonsense. After everything settled in our Alexei survival verse, he at least has appreciation for the fact that Alexei isn't still insistent that he just "did the right thing", but accepts that he did what he thought was right and acknowledging that it wasn't. If Alexei truly wants to atone, Yuri will give him that chance because the people Yuri dealt with before "like" Alexei didn't care to atone. Their upset at being found out was purely selfish, and their only regret was that their life was in danger. Alexei has potential to go up in the affection section, even if it's going to hard to break into on Yuri's end (especially because the betrayal directly affected Flynn and Raven, so it wasn't just a betrayal that he could've been like oh yeah a knight betraying people what a surprise. It deeply hurt people he loves and that plays a huge role in his stubbornness to forgive).

Interest: If Alexei could really be the type of person he used to be again, then Yuri would like to see that. Right now he isn't sure where Alexei will go, or if he'll just wallow in guilt. Both Raven and Flynn seemed to see something in Alexei that Yuri didn't, and he wants to trust their opinions on what Alexei used to be/could be again, but he's skeptical. He accepts Alexei wanting to atone, and he's interested in getting to know the Alexei that people used to know, but the main barrier is that he's interested in a ghost of Alexei that he can't be sure will be revived. He'll give him the chance, but he's not holding out on expectations.

Loyalty: At the moment, none. It's possible he might gain some along the way, but at the moment, he doesn't feel any sense of loyalty toward him.