Good evening, afternoon, or morning.
I can't claim to know what time of day you're reading this, or where, or even how, so you'll have to excuse the uncertain greeting.
My name is Phoebe- I've written fanfiction here before, including one for Dark Souls (under different names), but up to date I've been uncertain how to complete them- not to mention that in the middle of writing the aforementioned Dark Souls story (a crossover with far, far too many characters and groups), Dark Souls 3 came out and utterly dashed most of the intentions I had for it to comply with overarching canon, aside from my additions.
But if the choice is to try again or go hollow, there is truly no choice at all.
This will not be a crossover. There will be no major-character OCs, aside from a few characters spoken of that never received characterization. No, not even the player-character of the series, the Chosen Undead, will be an OC unless something goes... wrong.
Characterization may be slightly different to your interpretation or even canon- this is because I am imperfect. Forgive me.
Discussion of physics and 'science' as it pertains to Dark Souls lore will be discussed at occasional length in the story, if only to grant understanding to those unfamiliar with the series, add depth, and help game mechanics translate to the setting itself. Occasionally, these will not match up precisely with how things work in-game. Occasionally things may change entirely. If I do things properly, perhaps some things will match up far better than you expect them to.
Colloquialisms will occasionally be used that do not seem to suit the world or 'time period' of the games. In practice, it is because sometimes there are no better, punchier ways of getting meaning across that I can think of. In dialogue, it is easy enough to think these are simply 'rough translations' of what characters are actually saying. In intent, they will not detract from the greater story to be told.
This story will move quickly when I am not focusing on dialogue, lore, science or physics. I will not dwell on areas 'uninteresting' to me, areas where there is little more to do than fight and kill, often. There will still be occasional fight scenes, because I quite like writing them, but Battle Against Group of Rats #7 hardly deserves a paragraph of note when Kirk is waiting just around the corner. Expect occasional leaps forward in 'time' with little warning save a page break. Expect very little romance, as well, aside from obvious pairings. This is not that kind of story.
This is my thank-you to one of the greatest game series I have ever played, right up there with Legacy of Kain, Jet Set Radio, Silent Hill (before Konami fucked it, the bastards), The House in Fata Morgana (visual novel. Still counts), Undertale, Armored Core, this absolute blast of a WoD-Genius game a friend of mine runs, and many others besides.
I hope you enjoy my farewell to Dark Souls, and please leave a review if you feel so inclined. They kindle my bonfire.
Yes, that was a euphemism.
-Phoebe
In the Age of Ancients the world was unformed, shrouded by fog. A land of gray crags, Archtrees and Everlasting Dragons. But then there was Fire and with fire came disparity. Heat and cold, life and death, and of course, light and dark. Then from the dark, They came, and found the Souls of Lords within the flame. Nito, the First of the Dead, The Witch of Izalith and her Daughters of Chaos, Gwyn, the Lord of Sunlight, and his faithful knights. And the Furtive Pygmy, so easily forgotten.
With the strength of Lords, they challenged the Dragons. Gwyn's mighty bolts peeled apart their stone scales. The Witches weaved great firestorms. Nito unleashed a miasma of death and disease. And Seath the Scaleless betrayed his own, and the Dragons were no more.
Thus began the Age of Fire. But soon the flames will fade and only Dark will remain. Even now there are only embers, and man sees not light, but only endless nights. And amongst the living are seen, carriers of the accursed Darksign.
Yes, indeed. The Darksign brands the Undead. And in this land, the Undead are corralled and led to the north, where they are locked away, to await the end of the world.
Only, in the ancient legends it is stated, that one day an undead shall be chosen to leave the undead asylum, in pilgrimage, to the land of ancient lords, Lordran.
Picture a bleak place. Bleaker. No, more harrowing and stagnant even than that. Take it to the furthest point your mind will allow, where madness was preferable to the eternity-old stains that cake the walls. It was bleaker, even than that, in all meanings of the word.
Atop the cliffsides of Hallowreach, there stands a building as a testament to denial. Few brave its nearing, and none need to, so remote is the fortress. No paths lead to it now, and even the great iron winches that once raised and lowered its drawbridge have rusted shut, denying all entry. The stones were charmless, inhospitable, and seemingly proud of that fact even as they crumbled away little by little off the cliffside it stood upon. Even the weathor second the feeling, with blisteringly cold winds, sleet, and just enough snow to be hazardous and barren of vegetation without encroaching on beauty.
Miserable, like every one of its mindless inhabitants.
The Undead Asylum, they called it. A prison in all but name, few humans were brought there mentally disturbed, but no centuries in this hole were ever kind. Here, those who were not mad soon became it. There was no escape- not over the walls, not through the gates, not past the massive demons that still walked its halls as guardians, wreaking more death upon those who could not die.
Instead of ever managing escape, the undead slowly lost their hope. They slowly lost their minds. They quickly lost their humanity- indeed, that was often the first to go. Finally, they lost their lives. All it added up to, was becoming everything people feared of the Undead. Hollow.
The broken dregs of humanity laboring under an eternal curse, shambling, attacking all those that even held a spark of the life that had left them and trying to claim it- fruitlessly- for themselves. There was no conceivable way any single one of them could ever even think of escaping again, let alone accomplish it. There was only the Hunger, and the crushing Loss.
Indeed, no prisoner could ever dream of escaping this place. Even if they had attempted to band together before their minds fled them, the Asylum had not always been crumbling, ruined. There is nothing you can do, behind a locked door of iron bars with only a human's strength.
But maybe... maybe you could break in.
Not through the crumbling hole in the earth that led into a basement cell- that was proven worthless, still sealed with sturdy bars and lock. Throwing a nearby body down said hole proved it was occupied by another Hollow undead- locked, never to escape, rising at the corpse's sound with still-obvious hunger.
No, with a rope and grappling hook, to scale the battlements on the rightmost side. A good set of armor, full plate, or near it. The tabard wasn't necessary, but he'd worn it too long to give up his colors now. A sword and shield, good Astoran steel, the former enchanted against demons and undead by skilled priests of Allfather Lloyd's Way of White, the latter warded by mage-scholars of the Dragon School to absorb most magics it could be brought to bear against.
Oh yes, Sir Oscar of Astora was dutifully prepared. Food and water were no concern- he had an estus flask, a pale green vessel that could cup the life-giving Flame and condense it into a beverage even an undead can enjoy. It mended wounds that a human would have to rely on magics, time, or rest, for. Being undead, if you had not yet gone Hollow, had its advantages for certain.
He had a purpose, a hope. Sure, in the back of his mind he suspected it was a ruse- that there was truly nothing to find in the Asylum, that his quest was pointless, that the 'fate of the undead' was meaningless, that he had no right to find Lordran when countless others had failed, but at least he had one. In having that, he was unstoppable barring imprisonment or dead ends. If slain, an Undead's corpse would, eventually, rise again. There was no need for nourishment by food or water. His limbs would never tire for long. He needn't even breathe. The only real consequence of this insufferable curse was the Darksign; a circular patch of rotted grey-green flesh upon his chest, ringed by the red and raw skin of an infection- something that any human would shriek at, and run, in dismay.
Then again, he had yet to truly die, after contracting the sign. Oscar was unsure what consequences came after, aside from arising again, and few scholars were willing to teach, understandably. A sobering question to ask, halfway up a massive stone wall while clinging to a rope with multiple pounds of armor and gear hanging from your shoulders.
By the time he reached the top, even Oscar needed to stop and rest for a moment. Undead or no, it had been a harrowing task. He would take off his helmet, pull up his rope and pack, then have a look around the top as soon as his joints stopped aching.
...That moment to stop and rest had been all the time that was needed for a massive club to hit him square in the back and cause him to crash entirely through the stone roof. Through the limited vision provided by his helmet, though it was much-loved and cared for, he never saw the massive bulk of what had done him in.
Unfortunate.
