A/N: Yes that's right, it's disclaimer time. Wakfu and all related elements therein belong to Ankama. This story is basically my brainchild, as I wanted to really expand a bit more on Qilby's character history, particularly since there are six very notable pages in volume one of the Wakfu manga where Yugo is agonizing over his choice to re-imprison Qilby in the White Dimension, bordering on regret. Those pages sort of helped to spur this idea, so there you have it. There's going to be a lot of headcanon ideas involved.
Honestly I don't even know what I was expecting or hoping for. That things would change? That maybe this time it would go differently? That perhaps for once, for the first time in my many lifetimes, I would finally be heard? That the logic and wisdom behind my choices and my actions would be acknowledged and accepted?
It was a fool's errand, and perhaps it always had been.
Thinking on it, perhaps I had been wrong to confront Adamaï without Yugo present. I had worried Yugo's sense of justice would have gotten in my way, but perhaps instead I wove my own ruin by underestimating how suspicious Adamaï was growing. Honestly, I should have anticipated that from the start. Adamaï has never been one to trust as easily as Yugo.
My stomach twists uncomfortably in my anger. There is no cold or heat in the White Dimension, but I feel an old burning deep in every fiber of my being. I curl in on myself tightly, my nails digging into the skin of my arms so violently I can feel it break and the blood begin to well up.
Except it doesn't. I don't have a left arm. Not anymore.
Beads of sweat burst out of my pores as my heart rate elevates, and I have to take several deep, uneasy breaths before I calm down. It has been some time since the last intrusive memory attack; it has been longer still since I had one that also brought with it phantom pain. Where did that memory come from? This incarnation, prior to that bastard Phaeris taking my arm? The life previous? Four lives ago, perhaps? I curl my remaining arm around my knees and stare resolutely into the white. It hardly matters. After Shinonome's words cut me so deep, little matters.
Of course, I don't blame my sister or hold that against her. No, the whole thing, the entire ordeal, can place its origin of blame upon Yugo. Arrogant, pretentious Yugo and his unrelenting attachment to sentimental ideals, put into his head by youth's brightness. Yugo had opposed me years ago and he had opposed me yet again, this time poisoning my own beloved sister against me.
Betrayal was bitter. Perhaps this was how my people felt…?
Except they won't weigh in their own sins. They cry out betrayal and point the finger of accusation, yet none of them acknowledge their neglect of me. No… no, I am not to blame. If I am a monster, it is because they made me one. They cared not a whit for me, not as a person. They used me as a tool, over and over, and even then they never truly put to use my knowledge and my wisdom.
The thought gives me a modicum of comfort. I am not to blame. The fault rests with Yugo, whatever he may claim to the contrary.
A bitter laugh builds in my chest, somewhere in my breastbone, climbing higher until it claws its way out of my mouth and twists my lips. The little fool had urged me to change, to give up my aims. Arrogant child! He has no idea, cannot even begin to fathom how much our people could benefit from what I know, from what I could do for them. I do not want kingship; I never have. But a child-king needs a guide, and once that child begins to grow into his role, then he shall need an advisor to help him stay on the right path to lead our scarred nation.
He ruined his chance. He spat in my face at the very thought.
My breathing becomes shallow again.
Yugo lost his chance to learn from me. I extended my hand in an open offer of brotherhood and he struck it away. He hasn't changed. He expects me to, but he never tries to see anything from my perspective. Typical!
Why should I?
My fingers lower, stroking the velvet-soft petals of the small, pink blossom that came with me into this wretched place for comfort. Why should I change? Because I'm inconvenient for them as I am? Phaeris hasn't changed. Grougaloragran hasn't, and neither has Adamaï. And Yugo… Yugo has changed least of all.
Nothing has changed. Nothing ever changes.
So why should I?